By Valerie Ricordi, MOCA

The Museum of Contemporary Art, North Miami (MOCA)’s new documentary “Collector to Collector,” opens with Rosalind Jacobs,  whose lifelong friendships with many of the artists in the Surrealist and Dadaist movements resulted in an amazing collection of works by Marcel Duchamp, Max Ernst and most substantially, Man Ray.   Ms. Jacobs recounts how she came to own an original Magritte oil painting,  L’Autre Son de Cloche.  “I had a birthday in Paris and every time I went into the Copley’s house, I almost died for that picture. They took it off the wall and said ‘Happy Birthday.’ Can you believe it? Then they took it out of the frame and put it in an envelope so I could take on the plane.”  Mid-flight she realized the painting was missing. “I was mildly hysterical,” she confessed.  Leaning in, she told the rapt audience,  “Do you know it turned up at lost and found in Orly two weeks later.“

Rosalind Jacobs at Collector to Collector

So begins an hour of candid conversations with eight prominent art collectors  who share the challenges, rewards,  and passions that have motivated them as they built their renowned holdings –four of which ARTnews has recognized as among the top 100 collections in the world. Featuring Irma Braman, Estelle and Paul Berg, Ella Fontanals-Cisneros, Rosalind Jacobs,  Andrew Hall, Boris Hirmas, and  Martin Margulies,  together with MOCA’s former Director Bonnie Clearwater, “Collector to Collector” was filmed in March 2013  and will premier as a two-part series on the WPBT2 program “art loft” November 12 and 19 at 7:30 pm. The program will be aired in its entirety Sunday, November 24 at 4 pm.

Andrew Hall at Collector to Collector

The program covers how the collectors got their start, their selection and the various ways they now share their collections.  Most intriguing are the broader topics of, as Andy Hall phrases it, “how art history gets written” and how the art has shaped them.  Entrepreneur Boris Hirmas, explains “Art teaches you creativity and creativity teaches you how to solve problems.”

Boris Hirmas

Collector to Collector: Conversations at MOCA television series has been made possible with support from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.

Ella Cisneros with Bonnie Clearwater at Collector to Collector