Larry Gagosian

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Larry Gagosian (born April 19, 1945, Los Angeles), born Lawrence Gilbert Gagosian is an Armenian-American art dealer who owns the Gagosian Gallery chain of art galleries, with three locations in New York City (on Madison Avenue, West 24th St. and 21st St.), two locations in London (on Britannia and Davies Streets), one location in Los Angeles (in Beverly Hills) and one in Rome.

Gagosian got his start in business by selling posters near the campus of UCLA in Los Angeles. In the early 1980s he developed his business rapidly by exploiting the possibilities of reselling works of art by blue-chip modern and contemporary artists, earning the nickname "Go-Go" in the process. Working in concert with collectors including Douglas Cramer, Eli Broad and Keith Barish he developed a reputation for knowing how to push prices upwards as well as for staging museum quality exhibitions.

After establishing a New York gallery in the mid-1980s Gagosian began to work with a stable of super collectors including David Geffen, Charles Saatchi and Samuel Newhouse Jr. Bidding on behalf of Newhouse in 1988, Gagosian paid over $17 million dollars for "False Start" by Jasper Johns, a then-record price for a work by a living artist.

Among the important artists and estates currently represented by Gagosian are Richard Artschwager, Cecily Brown, Chris Burden, Francesco Clemente, John Currin, Walter de Maria, Ellen Gallagher, Douglas Gordon, Damien Hirst, Howard Hodgkin, Neil Jenney, Mike Kelley, Anselm Kiefer, Maya Lin, Vera Lutter, Anselm Reyle, Edward Ruscha, Jenny Saville, Richard Serra, David Smith, Philip Taaffe, Mark Tansey, Robert Therrien, Cy Twombly, Andy Warhol and Richard Wright.