Hedge fund billionaire Steve Cohen has been unmasked as the mystery buyer of last week's record-breaking $91 million auction of Jeff Koons' «Rabbit.»
Last week, Jeff Koons set a new record for the highest auction price for living artist in Christie's postwar and contemporary art sale, when his work «Rabbit» (1986), a 3-foot-tall stainless steel copy of a plastic inflatable bunny, was sold to a mystery buyer.
Previously owned by the late publishing magnate S.I. Newhouse, the sculpture was sold to a buyer represented by veteran dealer Steven Mnuchin, the father of U.S. Treasury Secretary Robert Mnuchin.
That person is «definitively» hedge fund manager and art collector Steve Cohen, according to Artnet, which did not cite its source.
Koons is a figure both loved and loathed in the art world. At $91.1 million, «Rabbit» beats his previous record sale in 2013 of «Balloon Dog (Orange)» for $58.4 million and makes him the most expensive living artist, a title he briefly lost to David Hockney in 2018, when «Portrait of an Artist (Pool With Two Figures)» was sold for $90.3 million.
Top Art Collector
Cohen, one of the world's top art collectors, had previously denied purchasing the work
Cohen (pictured above) is an American hedge fund manager and founder of Point72 Asset Management. Its predecessor, S.A.C. Capital Advisors, pled guilty for insider trading and paid a $1.8 billion fine in November 2013. He began collecting art in 2000, and according to Forbes, his collection, which includes paintings and sculptures by Picasso, Andy Warhol and more, is estimated at $1 billion.
According to Forbes, his net worth as of March 2018 is estimated at $14 billion.
