Sotheby’s has tapped Grammy Award-winning hip-hop producer Kaseem Dean, aka Swizz Beatz, to organize the house’s upcoming Contemporary Curated auction on September 25.
The hit-maker and avid art collector selected 16 favorite works from over 340 lots on offer, choosing pieces by Kehinde Wiley, Richard Serra, Faith Ringgold, and Kerry James Marshall.
Swizz explained how he went about choosing works for the auction. “I love to look at art, ride the feeling, then submit to it,” he said. “The pieces that spoke to me are really varied, which is important. I think about overall quality, how a single piece stands against a larger body of work, my instincts, and, naturally, the estimated value relative to the market.” The producer added that he also looked for “naturally occurring things like nuance, power, harmony, persistence, narrative, and meaning, plus the more deliberate aspects like color, composition and form.”