5 Art Collections That Are Almost Too Good to Be True
5 of the world’s wealthiest family’s art collections that will blow your mind!
In 1855, Baron James Mayer de Rothschild wrote, “No price is too high for the acquisition of true masterpieces”. The patriarch of the French branch of the Rothschild family was not alone in this sentiment. For many of the world’s wealthiest families, building an art collection is not just a means of creating and preserving a legacy, but it also serves as an investment and overall asset diversification strategy. Let’s explore 5 of the world’s wealthiest family’s art collections:
1. The Royal Family
$12.7 Billion +
The Royal Family - one of the last great European royal collections to remain intact, the Royal Collection is a unique and valuable record of the personal tastes of kings and queens over the past 500 years, including 30,000 drawings and watercolors, and more than 7,000 paintings.
2. The Rothschilds
$2 Billion +
The Rothschilds - for this family, collecting has been a tradition since the late 18th century. Today, many of the world’s greatest works of art have a Rothschild provenance.
3. The Rockefellers
$835.1 Million +
The Rockefellers - the Peggy & David Rockefeller estate auction broke records totaling $835.1 million in sales in 2018, making it the most significant charitable auction in history. While a large number of works are sold and no longer in the family’s possession, their collection is still one of the most sizable by one family to date.
4. The Waltons
$500 Million +
The Waltons - curated largely by the world’s richest woman, Walmart heiress, and philanthropist, Alice Walton, the Walton collection is estimated to be worth half a billion dollars and can be seen in part at her family-funded museum, Crystal Bridges in Arkansas.
5. The Hermés Family
Unknown value
The Hermés Family - while information about the art collection of this $94.6 billion family remains somewhat elusive, reports suggest that it comprises more than 10,000 items and includes several thousand books, predominantly centered around equestrian themes.
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The Takeaway
So why do these families have such large collections? Aside from the obvious beauty and cultural significance, these families know the secret about fine art that the average person does not…
Historically, fine art has served as an excellent storehold of value, allowing its collectors and investors to consistently grow their wealth at a high-rate of return. Its all-weather nature comes with a history of outperformance vs. mainstream assets, and even increasing in value when inflation is high, or the stock market is sinking.
This article originally appeared on MasterWorks.com and was syndicated by MediaFeed.org.
