Paul Kasmin, who spent three decades at the heart of New York’s art scene, died yesterday morning at his home in upstate New York. The cause of death was cancer, which the gallerist had battled for many years. He was 60 years old.
Kasmin was a staunch supporter of his artists and possessed a keen eye for talent. A British import, he was a sharp dresser, oenophile, and a consummate conversationalist. “Paul was about beauty and deliciousness of all kinds and stripes,” Louis Bofferding, an Upper East Side decorative and fine art dealer as well as an AD contributor, comments to AD PRO. “He was besotted equally by Titian and Twombly, cordon bleu and curry. His artists were immensely talented, but it didn’t hurt if they, like his friends, were bohemian, erudite, racy, and a bit grand—all qualities he possessed himself, to one degree or another.”
Kasmin opened his eponymous New York gallery in 1989 in SoHo and moved his operations to Chelsea in 2000, one of the first gallerists to do so. He was furthering a family legacy—his father was John Kasmin, or “Kas,” the legendary London art dealer and collector who nurtured the careers of figures like David Hockney and Frank Stella. When Paul was around 10 years old, his father took him on a trip to New York City, bringing him on artist visits and even to Andy Warhol’s Factory. “Coming from England, nothing prepared me for how much I would be blown away by New York,” Paul said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal in 2012. “And here I am.”
Today, Kasmin Gallery—which, due to COVID-19, has been open by appointment only since March 13—has four exhibition spaces in Chelsea. The latest addition, a Markus Dochantschi–designed building that opened on West 27th Street in 2018, features a sweeping rooftop sculpture garden viewable from the High Line, a coup for public sculpture. The gallery is known for a heterogeneous roster interspersing the estates of major post-war artists—Constantin Brancusi, Lee Krasner—with more contemporary figures.
Several of the artists in Kasmin’s stable are celebrated for challenging the divisions between art and design: Mattia Bonetti, whose one-of-a-kind furniture filled Kasmin’s town house near Central Park, and David Wiseman, who contemporizes decorative art traditions with impeccably crafted work. “When Paul shared with my brother, Ari, that he had been following my work…and wanted to show it, it was one of the single greatest honors of my life,” Wiseman tells AD PRO. “I can’t think of another dealer who has done more to champion and celebrate artists who would normally have been siloed in their respective worlds. You could tell he was driven by his gut belief in us—his artists. He often sent me monographs of my favorite artist heroes—many of which he published—and introduced me to new ones. When he would visit the studio to see the works in progress, a wry smile would break through his reserved Anglo-gentility. His face would alight, and it was clear that he believed in the good things to come.”
Don't miss the AD PRO-exclusive workshop—Photo Finish: How to Showcase Your Project
Kasmin Gallery famously represents artist duo Les Lalanne. A husband-and-wife pair comprising François-Xavier, who passed away in 2008, and Claude, who died just last year, the couple are known for their whimsical, surreal, animal-inspired pieces: flocks of faux sheep, hippopotamuses that morph into bathtubs or bar carts, and cabbages standing atop chicken legs. Kasmin mounted the first U.S. exhibition of their work in 2007; the pair went on to become art market darlings, beloved by prominent figures across art, architecture, fashion, and design including Yves Saint Laurent, Serge Gainsbourg, Peter Marino, Jacques Grange, and Madison Cox, who curated the labyrinthine exhibition “Les Lalanne” at Kasmin Gallery in 2015. He describes the gallerist to AD PRO as being “passionately inquisitive…[and] someone who I dearly loved.” Kasmin’s enthusiasm for Les Lalanne was such that in 2012 he even published a collection of his own photographs of the duo amid their artistic creations at their fantastical French residence.
In his later years, Kasmin developed a renewed enthusiasm for photography, a lifelong passion. On the occasion of his death, the gallery’s website has posted a selection of Kasmin’s personal photographs of his family and friends, the gallery’s artists, and his larger artistic community—collectively, an image of just a few of the lives that he touched. “In our generation, few gallerists are like Paul,” AD100 designer Richard Mishaan reflects to AD PRO. “He did research and truly knew everything about what he would be showing and passed along that knowledge without any pretense whatsoever. He guided us, and for me personally, contributed to making my art collection exceptional. I will miss Paul on many levels. I truly loved him and cherished our friendship.”
"Paul and I first met some 25 years ago on a vacation, at decorator Peter Dunham’s house on the Spanish Mediterranean coast: those were wonderful days, full of fun and joy. Time passed, he went his way and I went mine," Mattia Bonetti later shared with AD PRO via email. "And it was only in 2008 that our paths crossed again, due to another common friend, landscape designer Madison Cox who had the idea to put us together. This time our relation became real, a professional one, but how would it have it been possible with a person like Paul to separate work from friendship? Impossible. . . .And therefore, one year after the other, one show after the next, our relationship became closer and more intimate. I particularly appreciate the openness of his views on all the arts. He always gave me good advice for my work, because he was so cultivated, original, and full of humor. I’m very sad about his loss. I'll no longer be able to share with him about work, sitting around an excellent dinner with a nice bottle of wine."
