Artist – collector of art: are there differences vis-à-vis a “regular” collection?
In our publication “Artists Collecting Art” from May 23rd 2012, this was the central issue. Jan Rauchwerger said then: “Artists, it seems, choose to collect in need of a beneficial energy; they search for ‘soul food’, conversation, company, a kind of security that will allow them to maintain a dialogue.
…Eventually, I believe the artists are the ones to determine who ‘real’ artists are. Of course, there are art critics, art dealers and curators. However, I believe that in most cases, artists arbitrate who a fellow artist is.”
The collection of Olga and Alexander Florensky can be easily considered as another angle of their creative process. It contains hundreds of paintings, graphics, ceramics, collages and other art objects. According to Alexander, the works of his favorite authors could easily suffice for an excellence solo exhibition of each one of them. Apart from the collection in Saint-Petersburg, there is another large collection of Georgian artists, at the Tbilisi flat of Florensky.