Harry and Linda Macklowe were married for 57 years. Their acrimonious divorce battle dragged on for years and delayed the 81-year-old billionaire's plans to marry his girlfriend. Macklowe has been seeing 62-year-old Patricia Landeau for the past four years. In fact, Marlowe put his French mistress up in a secret Park Avenue apartment just a few blocks away from his marital home with Linda Macklowe at The Plaza. Harry Macklowe claimed to be broke, in an effort to deny his wife of nearly six decades any financial support. Fortunately, the judge saw through that ruse and ordered the couple's art collection to be sold to help resolve the divorce settlement. Now, the world's biggest auction houses are gearing up for the fight over the Macklowe's $700 million art collection.
The Macklowes' collection contains at least 64 works of art, including the $50 million Andy Warhol work "Nine Marilyns."
In the art world, it is said that there are "three Ds" that send masterpieces to the auction block: death, debt, and divorce.
Harry and Linda Macklowe began collecting soon after they got married in 1959. Their collection includes works by Picasso and Mark Rothko. The art collection is the most valuable marital asset. It is expected that most of the top works will be sold. Proceeds will be shared between the former couple.
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The couple got into art collecting very early and bought well. They own two works by Mark Rothko, "No. 7" from 1951 and "Untitled" from 1960 that are worth a combined $100 million. The Macklowe's bought Warhol's "Sixteen Jackies" for $15.7 million in 2006.
The judge's ruling did stipulate that Linda Macklowe, a trustee of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, could keep 100 works valued at nearly $40 million. Harry will receive a credit for half that amount applied to the divorce settlement.
