Old Masters and Contemporary Art, Who Can Bring Them Together

The current holy grail in the art market is to vector the demand for Contemporary art into less competitive fields that perhaps have greater quality. Old Master paintings is one of the fields with glaring price discrepancies. Here Fabrizio Moretti promotes his collaboration with Sotheby’s on the matter. (Click through to view the video.)

Moretti has made a name for himself specialising in works from the 14th to the 18th centuries, most notably Italian Renaissance painting and sculpture. At 38, he is young for his field. And while he may live and work surrounded by Madonnas and saints, he’s also an avid collector of the new: Jeff Koons, Wade Guyton, Richard Prince and Gerhard Richter. That Moretti sees no contradiction between the two interests is the key to his sensibility.

“I’m here to look, to learn, to improve my knowledge of contemporary art,” Moretti says modestly. He is seated on a velvet-covered sofa inside the East 82nd Street town house that is his New York outpost.

Christie’s does something similar by highlighting a younger staffer in the Old Master department.