Dani Levinas, an art collector who gained a following by interviewing other collectors, has died at the age of 75. The Phillips Collection in Washington, DC, where he previously served as chairman of the board, announced his death on Wednesday.
“Dani Levinas’ passion and enthusiasm for the art of living artists will have a lasting impact on the Phillips Collection,” current board chair John Despres said in a statement. “We will truly miss his inspiration and guidance.”
With his wife Mirella, Levinas bought an important grouping of works by Latin American artists, acquiring pieces by Jose Dávila, Cildo Meireles, Gabriel de la Mora, Iván Navarro, Jorge Pardo, etc. However, his collection also came to include works by artists based outside the region, with works also by Anish Kapoor and Amalia Pica.
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“I love helping artists, but I also enjoy living with the pieces,” he said New York Times in 2020.
His most enduring legacy within the art world, however, is not his collection, but his conversations with his colleagues, from the late Rosa de la Cruz to the collecting couple Don and Mera Rubell. He published these interviews in a 2023 book called The Guardians of Art: Conversations with Great Collectors and as articles in The country, where he worked as a columnist. “I don’t just collect art, I collect collectors,” he said times interview
Born in 1948 to Jewish immigrants who had left Europe for Argentina, Levinas left for the United States in 1981 amid the rise of a military junta in his native country. He launched his own company and through it sold prepaid debit cards.
He was chairman of the board of the Phillips Collection from 2016 to 2022 and also served on the board of the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden.
He spoke of his collection as an entity in permanent evolution, counting the times, “After 50 years of collecting, you change; the work of art changes and so do you”.
