Pauline Karpidas (born Manchester) is an English contemporary art collector, private art space benefactor, socialite,[1] and patron of the arts. She lives in the United States.[2]
Early life and career
Karpidas moved from Manchester to London in her early 20s after studying at secretarial school but then relocated to Greece where she opened a clothing boutique in Athens called My Fair Lady.[3]
Art collection
Karpidas was married to Constantine Karpidas a Greek shipping magnate. She was introduced to contemporary art by Athens art dealer Alexander Iolas in 1975.[4]
Karpidas is a patron of young artists whose work she displays at Hydra Workshop, her waterfront gallery in an old ship-repair garage of a mansion once belonging to the Bulgari family in Hydra, Greece;[5] she first visited Hydra in the early 1960s.[6] Each Summer, since 1999, she has been hosting over 100 guests on Hydra to view the latest additions to her Ophiuchus Collection on display at the Hydra Workshop.[7] Over the years, she worked with Sadie Coles[8] on hosting work by many artists at the Hydra Workshop, including Wilhelm Sasnal (2004),[9]Urs Fischer (2007), Carroll Dunham (2008),[10]Nate Lowman (2010), Sergej Jensen (2010),[11]Frank Benson (2011), Matt Johnson (2011), Mark Grotjahn (2011)[12] and Ryan Sullivan (2013).
In a 2007 interview with journalist Marina Fokidis, Karpidas said of her Hydra Gallery,
Having lived now for almost 35 years in Greece, and having been part of the Greek heritage through my marriage to my late husband, Constantine Karpidas, this is a way for me to continue his legacy, his involvement with and support of the arts.[13]
In 2009, Karpidas auctioned the Andy Warhol painting 200 One Dollar Bills, which she had bought with her late husband Constantine Karpidas. Characterizing the 1962 painting, art dealer Tony Shafrazi said, "We’ve seen nothing like this recently [come to auction], this is a masterpiece." The Karpidases paid $385,000 for the painting at a 1986 Sotheby's sale. After a dramatic "bidding war", the painting realized $43.8 million.[14][15][16] Karpidas made more than 100 times what had been paid in 1986.[17]
Philanthropy
Karpidas is a benefactor of the Tate and the Sir John Soane's Museum in London, and an education centre at New York's New Museum is named after her and her late husband—The Pauline and Constantine Karpidas Education Center.[18]
In 2012, Karpidas donated a vast sum of money to the University of Manchester, particularly to the Manchester Access Programme, including the Karpidas Excellence Scholarship. The donation also included 90 contemporary works of art for the museum's art museum, The Whitworth.[19]
Coles, Sadie & Karpidas, Pauline (ed.) Package Holiday: New British Art in the Ophiuchus Collection (1997) Works by Damien Hirst, Tracey Emin, Sam Taylor-Wood, Gary Hume, Angus Fairhurst, Paul Noble, Sarah Lucas, Don Brown, Chris Ofili, Richard Patterson, Peter Doig
