After reporting yesterday that Leon Black‘s publishing house Phaidon Press was in talks to purchase online art gallery Artspace, Bloomberg has published an article confirming the deal. Although the price paid by Phaidon for Artspace remains unknown, the article reports that, when Auctionata was in talks to acquire the gallery, Artspace had been valued at just under $5 million. The article also points out that this merger will give Phaidon Press and, by extension, Leon Black access to Artspace’s extensive mailing list of 150,000 active art collectors, increasing “[Phaidon’s] access to global art collectors who are also consumers of its art and design books and multimedia products”.

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An article on Bloomberg.com reports that collector and billionaire Leon Black is in talks to purchase Artspace through Phaidon Press, the publishing company he bought in 2012. Artspace has been in the news recently for its lower-than-expected sales figures, especially compared to its early success in fundraising. Previous reports indicated that the online auction site Auctionata was a prime contender to acquire Artspace but the Bloomberg article suggests that a deal between Black’s Phaidon Press and Artspace could be signed by the end of the week.  (more…)

Private Equity billionaire Leon Black has acquired publisher Phaidon from Richard Schlagman for an undisclosed sum. Black is chief executive of Apollo Global Management, an art collector and philanthropist. He paid $120 million for Edvard Munch’s The Scream at auction earlier this year. He also contributed $48 million to Dartmouth College, his alma mater, for the creation of the Black Family Visual Arts Center. (more…)

MoMA to exhibit Edvard Munch‘s 1895 version of The Scream on a 6-month loan from its new owner. The painting was recently sold at auction to an anonymous buyer, achieving the highest price ever paid at auction earlier this year ($120 million). The painting is the only one of four versions of The Scream that is privately held and has never been exhibited publicly in New York. It is the most colorful one of the series and is seen as a precursor to 20th century Expressionism. Although collector Leon Black is purported to be the present owner, neither Mr. Black, Sotheby’s nor MoMA confirmed as such. It will be on view from October 24 – April 29th.

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New York financier Leon Black is the record breaking buyer of Edvard Munch‘s $120 million ‘The Scream’ at Sotheby’s last Spring.

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