Incredible, Eccentric, Accidental: The Life of Art Collector Herbert Lust

I feel everything is accident I've just been lucky I don't know why and here's an accident that happened went to officers training in 1944 we had to take some literature courses and I took a course in the Romantic poets I've never really read literature before and I came across this poet named John Keats and something just devastated what beauty is important and then I began reading his letters soon it was six o'clock in the morning and my whole life was changed I never looked back [Music] this is my Carl Andre by the way one of the few Carl Andres that has a name it's called weather deck my cats play with it I don't dare touch it D'Arcangelo who is like its ninth or tenth ranking pop artist I think these are two very good examples I think they're very undervalued I knew him through my wife's gallery and liked them Stella I didn't know well he was the guest of honor two big party I gave on Sullivan Street Calder was a good friend both their wives loved to dance this is Rothko and called his wife was Bonita those guys danced and I was a very powerful swing dancer that picture there Hans Bellmer perhaps the greatest statement of sexual anxiety ever done del Mare is the most sexual artist in history Giacometti is the least sexual I love them both this is called Alberto Giacometti friendship and love about my friendship was shocking me and I didn't know what I was doing I just I wrote it he's a museum for some reason published I was a professional musician at one point the Chicago I always thought that I was going to be a novelist people say well you went to Wall Street and became rich but that again was an accident and I went there out of curiosity I think if you're an intellectual most important thing is curiosity but I never lost sight of the fact yeah what I was doing in Wall Street was utterly meaningless I began watching how stocks rose and fell but every time I went back to buy art was 10% more and then gradually two and two became four but I bought it just because I loved it I never thought it would become worth what it was you know I'm sort of the famous for being incredibly eccentric I had such an eccentric background my father comes from the Jewish aristocracy long line of wealthy businessmen professionals he was a famous railroad attorney my mother comes to the working class my mother was secretary after we were born in Chicago my father moved us to Indiana he didn't why his children brought up in the city I was the only child whose parents had gone to college but I was a jock learn letters and four or five sports that was important in that part of the world who people fought with their fists after the war I was 22 when I went to Paris on the first Fulbright they ever had then I was this I wouldn't say the greatest scholar from the other Shekhar was pretty good and then I met Giacometti at this luncheon and there again it's an accident I had no respect for art at all I thought it was it was decoration the next day he invited me to his studio it's the ugliest thing I ever saw but then the scholarship began to work and I realized you have Sartre ruts that he was the greatest living artist there was something wrong with me and then I realized he was a very great man a fool at times why was he a fool well he would talk about death but then stop him from smoking four packs of Gauloises a day he had only one worry that he was not succeeding as an artist that's why it was a hero in the art world he wanted to give a perfect vision of the human body and face and that's hard when you think of all the great faces and figures that have been done you know this nude by the way it's the only one with the real face at an important period of Giacometti it's a combination of his girlfriend and wife he gave me quite a few things I mean I'm embarrassed to say like these two paintings here was her priceless today basically gifts that's the first head he ever did there it's on the dust cover of this retrospect that's his first color painting this was a gift Schiaparelli herself asked him to do buttons for a coat but when Scott put him on the coat they were too heavy but that's how I got it 1973 having members you have the Yom Kippur War and I just come to New York I didn't know anything about American art and I was totally focused on European art and this friend of mine the chef was hired to his very prestigious wonder wealthiest families and all the DuPont's and mrs. DuPont had a lover Paul Jenkins was sort of a joke at the time who cranked out like 5,000 pictures a day he's not a joke anymore I knocked on the door mrs. du Pont comes in there's someone dying to meet you because you're a Hoosier because you were brought up in India I thought I was traveling in the moon who cares about our Hoosier she led me into this little room on the side and there was this gorgeous man Robert in the end the friendship driver saw him once or twice every week and I get of like with shop committee I said this is absurd these words love and hug and this is a little by little grew on me so I acquired this incredible collection of Indiana a little bit again by accident I loved Indiana he's the most difficult human being in history the greatest curator of course was the Alfred Barr and he saw the American dream one Indiana was completely unknown and he bought it from New Zealand Modern Art 1961 before Warhol or Lichtenstein wanted them here's the first pop artists and then he couldn't realize as he got older that certain facts of the art world are true there are very few good galleries and too many good artists his gallery went out of business in 1975 suddenly he didn't have a gallery I had a lot of power then because I was buying a lot and I remember I went out to dinner with Sidney Janis it was hard to be the most powerful dealer at the time I said was Sidney why don't you take Bob he said frankly Herbert he's a pain in the ass several times he stayed in this house at least six times I remember he was on this couch I said well what has destroyed your career and he's really said this my mouth and it really was true another axe well I think that all life is accident I know if I had five points less of IQ I would still be very rich but I never could have written these books I never could have built this collection that's that's luck this collection didn't often call the most eclectic in history I guess it is because I love car laundry I love it as much as the Giacometti most people say I'm a lunatic well it's true but not for that reason and it's a mystery why I go in so many different directions I think it's simple one word love and now I think that what these guys love is the ham and cheese sandwich come on [Music] you you

Channel: Sotheby's

Views: 109,226

Rating: 4.9274344 out of 5

Keywords: sothebystv, herbert lust, robert indiana, alberto giacometti, contemporary art, art investment

Id: nueeYVGrZrU

Length: 8min 29sec (509 seconds)

Published: Mon Dec 16 2019