Art power couple Dasha Zhukova and Roman Abramovich have announced that they are to split. The Russian billionaire power-couple founded Garage magazine, the Garage Museum of Contemporary Art in Moscow and the New Holland Island cultural centre in Saint Petersburg. They have also built a formidable contemporary art collection. Their marriage has lasted over a decade producing two children. A brief statement said, “After 10 years together, the two of us have made the difficult decision to separate, but we remain close friends, parents and partners in the projects we developed together.
This is the Chelsea Football Club owner Roman Abramovich’s third marriage. He is ranked No. 139 on Forbes’ Billionaires List, with a reported $9.1 billion.
Mr Abramovich made his money from property, steel and mining since the collapse of communism in Russia. Zhukova, 36, is the daughter of a Russian oil, metal and banking magnate. She was educated in the US and is on the board of the Metropolitan Museum in NY. She built the $27 million Rem Koolhaas-designed Garage Museum of Contemporary Art in Moscow that opened in 2015 and is a founding partner of the overhyped start-up Artsy.
Garage is a major non-profit organisation that opened its doors in 2008 and is determined to change the cultural landscape in Russia by developing the local and the international reach of a new generation of contemporary Rusian artists. These aims are explored through a series of exhibitions ranging from major surveys of important collections to single-artist retrospectives and group exhibitions. Garage also hosts a strong program of special events, including talks, film screenings, workshops, performances and creative activities for children and young people. In addition, Garage launched a joint publishing program with Ad Marginem Press in 2012. Garage is a project of the IRIS Foundation and is founded by Dasha Zhukova
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