Leo Castelli (born Leo Krausz; September 4, 1907 – August 21, 1999) was an Italian-American

art dealer An art dealer is a person or company that buys and sells works of art, or acts as the intermediary between the buyers and sellers of art. An art dealer in contemporary art typically seeks out various artists to represent, and builds relationshi ...

who originated the contemporary art gallery system. His gallery showcased

contemporary art Contemporary art is the art of today, produced in the second half of the 20th century or in the 21st century. Contemporary artists work in a globally influenced, culturally diverse, and technologically advancing world. Their art is a dynamic ...

for five decades. Among the movements which Castelli showed were

Surrealism Surrealism is a cultural movement that developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I in which artists depicted unnerving, illogical scenes and developed techniques to allow the unconscious mind to express itself. Its aim was, according to ...

Abstract Expressionism Abstract expressionism is a post–World War II art movement in American painting, developed in New York City in the 1940s. It was the first specifically American movement to achieve international influence and put New York at the center of the ...

, Neo-Dada, Pop Art,

Op Art Op art, short for optical art, is a style of visual art that uses optical illusions. Op artworks are abstract, with many better-known pieces created in black and white. Typically, they give the viewer the impression of movement, hidden image ...

, Color field painting, Hard-edge painting,

Lyrical Abstraction Lyrical abstraction is either of two related but distinct trends in Post-war Modernist painting: ''European Abstraction Lyrique'' born in Paris, the French art critic Jean José Marchand being credited with coining its name in 1947, considered ...

, Minimal Art,

Conceptual Art Conceptual art, also referred to as conceptualism, is art in which the concept(s) or idea(s) involved in the work take precedence over traditional aesthetic, technical, and material concerns. Some works of conceptual art, sometimes called ins ...

, and Neo-expressionism.

Early life and career

Leo Castelli was born Leo Krausz,Dwight Garner (May 18, 2010)
A Smooth Operator, at the Vanguard of the Gallery World in the 1960s
''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

''. in

Trieste Trieste ( , ; sl, Trst ; german: Triest ) is a city and seaport in northeastern Italy. It is the capital city, and largest city, of the autonomous region of Friuli Venezia Giulia, one of two autonomous regions which are not subdivided into pr ...

Austria-Hungary Austria-Hungary, often referred to as the Austro-Hungarian Empire,, the Dual Monarchy, or Austria, was a constitutional monarchy and great power in Central Europe between 1867 and 1918. It was formed with the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of ...

, the second of three children of Italian and Austro-Hungarian Jewish origin. Peter Schjeldahl (June 7, 2010)
Leo the Lion – How the Castelli gallery changed the art world
''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...

''. His father was Ernest Krauss, a Hungarian by birth, who had gone to Trieste as a young man and married wealthy heiress Bianca Castelli,Myrna Oliver (August 24, 1999)
Leo Castelli; Influential Dealer Promoted Careers of Artists From Johns to Warhol
''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the ...

''. from a family of coffee importersGerald Clarke (February 26, 1979)
Dealer Leo Castelli Sold the World on Pop Art, and Now He's Cleaning Up
''

People A person ( : people) is a being that has certain capacities or attributes such as reason, morality, consciousness or self-consciousness, and being a part of a culturally established form of social relations such as kinship, ownership of prope ...

''. which had long been based there.John Russell (August 23, 1999)
Leo Castelli, Influential Art Dealer, Dies at 91
''

''. After World War I, which the family spent in Vienna (where Leo Castelli learned perfect German), they returned to Trieste. The family changed its name to "Krausz-Castelli" and then "Castelli" in the mid-1930s, when

Benito Mussolini Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini (; 29 July 188328 April 1945) was an Italian politician and journalist who founded and led the National Fascist Party. He was Prime Minister of Italy from the March on Rome in 1922 until his deposition in ...

's government required names to be Italianized. After earning a law degree at the University of Milan in 1924, Castelli returned to Trieste, where his father had secured a job for him with an insurance company. In 1932, he went to work for an insurance company in Bucharest, where he married Ileana Schapira one year later. After their marriage, the couple honeymooned in Vienna and bought their first artwork, a

Matisse Henri Émile Benoît Matisse (; 31 December 1869 – 3 November 1954) was a French visual artist, known for both his use of colour and his fluid and original draughtsmanship. He was a draughtsman, printmaker, and sculptor, but is known primar ...

watercolor. Castelli's father-in-law, Mihai Schapira, helped him to be transferred in 1935 to the Banca d'Italia in Paris. There, Ileana's taste and money helped him start his first gallery at Place Vendôme in Paris, which was named for its co-director, the decorator René Drouin, and situated between the Ritz Hotel and the couturier

Elsa Schiaparelli Elsa Schiaparelli ( , also , ; 10 September 1890 – 13 November 1973) was a fashion designer from an Italian nobility, Italian aristocratic background. She created the Schiaparelli (fashion house), house of Schiaparelli in Paris in 1927, w ...

. Specializing in surrealistic art, the gallery opened in July 1939, with a show of modern and antique furniture, including commissioned pieces by Drouin, Max Ernst,

Meret Oppenheim In Egyptian mythology, Meret (also spelled Mert) was a goddess who was strongly associated with rejoicing, such as singing and dancing. In myth Meret was a token wife occasionally given to Hapy, the god of the Nile. Her name being a reference t ...

, Leonor Fini (a former girlfriend of Castelli's from Trieste),

Eugene Berman Eugène Berman (russian: Евгений Густавович Берман, links=no; 4 November 1899, Saint Petersburg, Russia – 14 December 1972, Rome) and his brother Leonid Berman (1896 – 1976) were Russian Neo-romantic painters and thea ...

, and other artists in the force field of Surrealism. Ileana's connections enabled the couple to flee to the United states at the start of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

. Castelli's parents did not escape but died in

Budapest Budapest (, ; ) is the capital and most populous city of Hungary. It is the ninth-largest city in the European Union by population within city limits and the second-largest city on the Danube river; the city has an estimated population o ...

, hounded by members of Hungary's fascist Arrow Cross Party. The couple would remain married for more than 25 years, and were friends and partners even after their divorce, when Ileana married Michael Sonnabend and that couple opened its own gallery. Castelli arrived in the United States in 1941, by way of Marrakesh, Tangier, Algeciras, Vigo and Havana. He took graduate history courses in economic history at

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

until volunteering for the Army, serving in the intelligence service in Europe. After the liberation of France, he was sent to Bucharest as an interpreter for the Allied commission that controlled the city. As a result of Castelli's military service, he was given American citizenship. Returning to New York, Castelli took a managerial position with his father-in-law's clothing factory.

Leo Castelli Gallery

In New York, the Castellis were two of only three non-artist members (the other was dealer Charles Egan) of the Club, an influential coterie founded in 1949 that included Willem de Kooning, Robert Rauschenberg, Franz Kline, and Ad Reinhardt. Castelli's first exercise as a private dealer came through Drouin, in 1947: some hundred canvases by Kandinsky, consigned by his widow, Nina. His first American curatorial effort was the

Ninth Street Show The 9th Street Art Exhibition of Paintings and Sculpture is the official title artist Franz Kline hand-lettered onto the poster he designed for the Ninth Street Show (May 21-June 10, 1951).

of 1951, a seminal event in the emergence of Abstract Expressionism. He soon attached himself to the pioneering gallerist Sidney Janis, one of the early proponents of the school. In 1957, he opened the Leo Castelli Gallery in a townhouse at 4 E. 77th Street between Madison and Fifth Avenues in New York City. From the mid-1960s through the 1970s, the gallery was perhaps the most prominent commercial venue for art in the world.Daniel Grant (February 24, 2011)
Leo Castelli's Cache Of Art-History Gold
''

Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...

''. Initially the gallery showcased European

, Wassily Kandinsky, and other European artists. However the gallery also exhibited American

Jackson Pollock Paul Jackson Pollock (; January 28, 1912August 11, 1956) was an American painter and a major figure in the abstract expressionism, abstract expressionist movement. He was widely noticed for his "Drip painting, drip technique" of pouring or splas ...

, Willem de Kooning,

Cy Twombly Edwin Parker "Cy" Twombly Jr. (; April 25, 1928July 5, 2011) was an American painter, sculptor and photographer. He belonged to the generation of Robert Rauschenberg and Jasper Johns. Twombly is said to have influenced younger artists such as ...

Friedel Dzubas Friedel Dzubas (April 20, 1915 in Berlin, Germany – December 10, 1994 in Auburndale, Massachusetts) was a German-born American abstract painter. Life and work Friedel Dzubas studied art in his native land before fleeing Nazi Germany in ...

, and

Norman Bluhm Norman Bluhm (March 28, 1921 – February 3, 1999), was an American painter classified as an abstract expressionist, and as an action painter. Biography He was born on March 28, 1921 in Chicago, Illinois. His father Henry Bluhm was of Polish ...

were some artists who were included in group shows. In 1958, Robert Rauschenberg and Jasper Johns joined the gallery, signaling a turning away from

, towards Pop Art, Minimalism and

. From the early 1960s through the late 70s, Frank Stella,

Larry Poons Lawrence M. "Larry" Poons (born October 1, 1937) is an American abstract painter. Poons was born in Tokyo, Japan, and studied from 1955 to 1957 at the New England Conservatory of Music, with the intent of becoming a professional musician. After ...

Lee Bontecou Lee Bontecou (January 15, 1931 – November 8, 2022) was an American sculptor and printmaker and a pioneer figure in the New York art world. She kept her work consistently in a recognizable style, and received broad recognition in the 1960s. Bont ...

, James Rosenquist, Roy Lichtenstein,

Andy Warhol Andy Warhol (; born Andrew Warhola Jr.; August 6, 1928 – February 22, 1987) was an American visual artist, film director, and producer who was a leading figure in the visual art movement known as pop art. His works explore the relationsh ...

, Robert Morris, Donald Judd, Dan Flavin,

, Ronald Davis, Ed Ruscha, Salvatore Scarpitta, Richard Serra, Bruce Nauman, Lawrence Weiner and Joseph Kosuth joined the stable of Castelli artists. He gave Johns, Stella and Lichtenstein their first one-man shows. Castelli opened a temporary annex, the Castelli Warehouse, on West 108th Street, with a show organized by Robert Morris, of environmental sculpture by nine artists, including Nauman, Serra, and Eva Hesse. In 1971 Leo Castelli opened a downtown

SoHo Soho is an area of the City of Westminster, part of the West End of London. Originally a fashionable district for the aristocracy, it has been one of the main entertainment districts in the capital since the 19th century. The area was deve ...

branch of the Leo Castelli Gallery at 420 West Broadway, in a building bought by the Hague Art Delivery Company and a cooperative of dealers: Castelli took the second floor; his former wife's Sonnabend Gallery took the third floor, and André Emmerich (later replaced by Charles Cowles) took the top floor; while John Weber, (former director of the

Dwan Gallery Dwan is both a surname and a given name. Notable people with the name include: *Allan Dwan (1885–1981), pioneering Canadian-born American film director, producer and screenwriter *Dorothy Dwan (1906–1981), American actress of the 1920s *Jack Dw ...

) rented his gallery on the fourth floor. In the 1980s, Castelli opened a second larger downtown exhibition space at a 142 Greene Street also in

. He later mounted joint shows with Mary Boone, of Julian Schnabel, in 1981, and David Salle, in 1982. Castelli also pioneered a stipend system that was unknown in New York when he opened his gallery. He put his artists on a payroll whether or not their work sold. For this and other reasons, desertions were initially rare among his artists. When Castelli discovered Serra in 1967, for example, he offered him a guarantee of three years of monthly payments even though he did not expect to sell any of the unknown sculptor's lead-plate work in that time. Castelli also was known for spotting new talent and insisting on European exposure for his American artists, leading to Rauschenberg in 1964 becoming the first American to win the

Venice Biennale The Venice Biennale (; it, La Biennale di Venezia) is an international cultural exhibition hosted annually in Venice, Italy by the Biennale Foundation. The biennale has been organised every year since 1895, which makes it the oldest of ...

's international grand prize in painting. His most important clients included Peter Ludwig and

Giuseppe Panza Giuseppe Panza di Biumo (23 March 1923 – 24 April 2010) was a collector of modern art. He lived in Milan and Varese, Italy. Life and work Giuseppe Panza was born on March 23, 1923, in Milan. His father, Ernesto, was a wine distributor who i ...

. Castelli's second wife, Antoinette Fraissex du Bost, opened Castelli Graphics, an art gallery devoted to the prints and photographs of Castelli Gallery and other artists.Antoinette Castelli, 58, Dies; President of Graphics Gallery
''New York Times'', September 4, 1987. The couple also had a son together, Jean-Christophe Castelli, but Antoinette Castelli died in 1987. In 1995 Leo Castelli married the Italian art historian Barbara Bertozzi Castelli. In 2015, Bertozzi Castelli opened a one-room satellite gallery at 1046 Madison Avenue, near 80th Street, with Robert Morris's installation ''Lead and Felt'' (1969).

Recognition

Castelli received the rosette of the

French Legion of Honor The National Order of the Legion of Honour (french: Ordre national de la Légion d'honneur), formerly the Royal Order of the Legion of Honour ('), is the highest French order of merit, both military and civil. Established in 1802 by Napoleon ...

, allegedly in exchange for donating works by Johns to the Centre Pompidou. The mayor of Trieste made him the honorary director of the Revoltella Museum. In 1998, the

National Arts Club The National Arts Club is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit and members club on Gramercy Park, Manhattan, New York City. It was founded in 1898 by Charles DeKay, an art and literary critic of the ''New York Times'' to "stimulate, foster, and promote publ ...

awarded Castelli its Centennial Medal of Honor. On this occasion,

Dennis Hopper Dennis Lee Hopper (May 17, 1936 – May 29, 2010) was an American actor, filmmaker and photographer. He attended the Actors Studio, made his first television appearance in 1954, and soon after appeared in '' Giant'' (1956). In the next ten year ...

called Castelli "the godfather of the contemporary art world." In 1982 a traveling exhibit honoring the 25th anniversary of Castelli Gallery visited the La Jolla Museum of Contemporary Art. The Museum of Art, Fort Lauderdale, showed "Three Decades of Exploration: Homage to Leo Castelli", an exhibit of more than 30 works by artists discovered, shown and encouraged by Castelli in 1987. That same year, the

Butler Institute of American Art The Butler Institute of American Art, located on Wick Avenue in Youngstown, Ohio, United States, was the first museum dedicated exclusively to American art. Established by local industrialist and philanthropist Joseph G. Butler, Jr., the museum h ...

presented "Leo Castelli: a tribute exhibition". In 1996, Gagosian Gallery mounted the exhibition "Leo Castelli: An Exhibition in Honor of His Gallery and Artists" in Beverly Hills.

Legacy

Many artists have enshrined Castelli in their works. Elaine de Kooning and Richard Artschwager painted his portrait, Warhol made a silkscreen of him in a jacket and tie. Frank Stella named a work after him, in 1992 he posed for the French artist Klaus Guingand who immortalized his shadow, and a sculpture by Robert Morris, ''Leo'', places a brain at the center of a target. In 1999, on the occasion of Castelli's death, ''

Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and event (philosophy), events that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various me ...

'' published a eulogy by James Rosenquist. In 1988, when there were no tax deductions for gifts to museums, Castelli gave one of the icons of postwar American art, Robert Rauschenberg's ''Bed'' (1955) to the

Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, and is often identified as one of t ...

. In 1992, amid rumors that Castelli was negotiating to sell his archives to the Getty Center in Los Angeles, his collection was said to be worth some $2 million. In October 2007, Castelli's heirs – his widow, Barbara Bertozzi Castelli, and his two children, Jean-Christopher Castelli and Nina Castelli Sundell – announced the donation of the gallery's archives from 1957 through 1999 to the

Smithsonian Institution The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums and education and research centers, the largest such complex in the world, created by the U.S. government "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge". Found ...

Archives of American Art The Archives of American Art is the largest collection of primary resources documenting the history of the visual arts in the United States. More than 20 million items of original material are housed in the Archives' research centers in Washing ...

. Castelli had been interviewed for the archive's oral-history project in 1969, 1973 and 1997. The Leo Castelli Gallery continues to operate at 18 East 77th Street in New York under the direction of his wife showing many of the same artists from the gallery's past. The Leo Award, presented annually by the Independent Curators International (ICI), is named after the late Castelli.Is Dasha Zhukova the Next Leo Castelli?
''ARTINFO'', August 7, 2012.

References

External links