Alexander Iolas - Biography

Biography

He was born in Alexandria, Egypt, on March 25, 1907, to Andreas and Persephone Coutsoudis. In 1924, he went to Berlin as a pianist, but soon started studying ballet. He fled to Paris during Hitler's rise to power in the 1930s where he continued to study dance and socialized with artists such as Jean Cocteau, Giorgio de Chirico, Georges Braque, Pablo Picasso, Man Ray, Rene Magritte and Max Ernst. There he bought his first work of art. As a dancer he toured extensively in Europe, the United States and Latin America with Theodora Roosevelt and later with the company formed by the Marquis George de Cuevas.

In 1944, gave up ballet after an injury and got involved with the art world. In New York, he becomes the director of the Hugo Gallery, founded in 1944 by Robert Rothschild, Elizabeth Arden and Maria dei Principi Ruspoli Hugo. There, Andy Warhol has his first solo exhibition Fifteen Drawings Based on the Writings of Truman Capote (June 16 – July 3, 1952)

After working at the Hugo Gallery, he founded the Jackson-Iolas Gallery in 1955 with former dancer, Brooks Jackson and later opened galleries under his own name in New York, Paris, Milan, Madrid and Geneva. Alexander Iolas represented in his galleries many artists, among others Andy Warhol, Rene Magritte, Roberto Matta, Ed Ruscha, Jean Tinguely, Joseph Cornell, Yves Klein, Jannis Kounellis, Takis, Victor Brauner, Jules Olitski, and Niki de Saint-Phalle. In promoting work that initially found few to favor it, he was able to reassure the potential client with his irresistible and often mischievous charm, dazzle them with his flamboyant personality and often sensational mode of dress.

Known primarily for his exclusive representation of the major European Surrealists in the United States- primarily Max Ernst and Rene Magritte - Alexander Iolas helped to form more than one important collection. In particular, John de Menil and Dominique de Menil, founders of the Menil Collection, had him as one of their three art consultants, along with Father Marie-Alain Couturier and Jermayne MacAgy.

In 1972 Iolas takes over Carla Lavatelli's studio on the 75th and 1st str. in New York for an exhibition. It was the first exhibition by a dealer at an artist's studio.

In 1976, he closed all his galleries except the one in New York after the death of Max Ernst, as he had promised him he would.

In 1984, Alexander Iolas commissioned Andy Warhol to create a group of works based on Leonardo Da Vinci's The Last Supper for an exhibition space in the Palazzo Stelline in Milan, located across the street from Santa Maria delle Grazie, home of Leonardo's masterpiece. Warhol exceeded the demands of the commission and produced more than 100 variations on the theme.

From early 1965, Alexander Iolas started traveling to Greece.

Extending his activities there, he contributed to the opening of some galleries in Athens, like the Iolas-Zoumboulakis gallery and the Bernier Gallery and he inspired the foundation of the Macedonian Museum of Contemporary Art in Thessaloniki to which he donated a large number of art works from his collection. He is listed as the Museum's 'great benefactor'.

In 1983 he was accused by a former employee for "antiquities smuggling, drug peddling, and the prostitution of young men"- but never charged, accusations that were circulated by the Greek tabloid newspaper, Avriani causing a scandal. By 1984 he was investigated for antiquities smuggling, later charged, and cleared only posthumously.

He died of AIDS in Cornell Medical Center in New York City on Monday 8 June 1987.