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Helga de Alvear dies

Collector and patron, he leaves an essential legacy for contemporary art.

Helga de Alvear dies
bonart madrid - 03/02/25

The German gallerist and collector Helga de Alvear (Kirn, 1936-Madrid, 2025), established in Spain since the late 1950s, dedicated her life to promoting contemporary art with a passion and commitment that have marked generations of artists and art lovers. Her death, confirmed by her foundation, leaves an immense legacy, materialized in one of the most relevant collections in Europe.

In 1957, at the age of 21, he decided to move to Madrid to learn Spanish and study Hispanic culture at the Complutense University of Madrid. The beginning of his career in the art world, however, dates back to 1967, when De Alvear met the gallery owner Juana Mordó and came into contact with the Spanish art scene. His first acquisition, a painting by Fernando Zóbel bought on installments, is the starting point of a collection that would eventually exceed 3,000 pieces and include names such as Helena Almeida , Francis Alys , Olafur Eliasson , Christian Marclay , Jeff Wall , Thomas Hirschhorn , Jorge Galindo and Ai Weiwei .

Helga de Alvear dies Helga de Alvear y Nam June Paik, videoartista coreà.

Helga de Alvear dies ‘Tercio II’, Fernando Zóbel (1962)

In 1980 he joined Juana Mordó's gallery and, two years later, participated in the creation of ARCO, the fair that would promote contemporary art in Spain. After Mordó's death in 1984, he took over the management of the gallery until, in 1995, he decided to open his own exhibition space in Madrid, located next to the Reina Sofia Museum. His gallery became one of the most solid and with the longest history in the artistic scene, obtaining wide recognition on an international scale. From there, he decidedly opted for artistic languages that were little explored in the country at that time, such as photography, video and installation, becoming one of the fundamental figures of the Spanish and international art market as well as in the projection of many creators.

Helga de Alvear dies ‘Echo activity’, Olafur Eliasson (2017)

De Alvear always believed in the transformative power of culture and the need to make it accessible to everyone. With this philosophy, in 2006 she created the Helga de Alvear Foundation , which four years later gave way to the Cáceres Visual Arts Center , a space that would serve as a preamble to the Helga de Alvear Museum , inaugurated in 2021. This museum, which Madrid, Granada, Córdoba and San Sebastián rejected before Cáceres welcomed it, has also consolidated itself as an international reference.

De Alvear was a great patron, a woman who understood the collection not as an accumulation of works, but as a heritage to be shared, leaving an indelible mark on the history of contemporary art.

Helga de Alvear dies 'Dry Clay Head on Concrete Floor', Mark Manders (2016)

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