Barbara Cartategui is an international art advisor based in New York City. Barbara works with clients worldwide to develop post-war and contemporary art collections for private residences, corporate collections, hotels, and foundations.
Barbara’s interest in art developed organically from a young age as she grew up around the art world. Her mother, Soraya Cartategui, founded a contemporary gallery in the Chelsea neighborhood of New York focused on Latin American artists in 1994.
The gallery later began to specialize in Old Masters and moved to Madrid, becoming the first in Spain to concentrate entirely on this period. Barbara was surrounded by paintings and other media daily, and has attended auctions, exhibitions, and art fairs around the world for over two decades.
These experiences have helped her accumulate knowledge of diverse art periods, an understanding of the intricacies of the art market, and deep relationships with art gallery directors, prominent artists, auction houses, and art historians. Perhaps more importantly, with years of context, Barbara has developed an eye for quality, market trends, valuation, and an artist’s trajectory.
Barbara has lived in Bangkok, Buenos Aires, New York, Madrid, and Brazil. Having lived in multiple countries and traveled extensively, she is sensitive to the many cultural nuances that must be navigated to create a comprehensive and impactful collection for a diverse clientele. Barbara can work with clients in Spanish, English, and Portuguese.
Barbara received a BBA in Design Management from Parsons The New School for Design in 2012 and an MA in visual art administration from New York University in 2014. During her undergraduate and graduate studies, she worked at Pace Gallery, where she was exposed to blue-chip contemporary artists such as Zhang Huan, Chuck Close, Adrian Ghenie, Yoshitomo Nara, Agnes Martin, and Lee Ufan. This experience taught her about the curatorial aspects of the business and the operations of a leading contemporary art gallery.
Cartategui has a global clientele. She travels extensively to international art fairs, including Madrid, Miami, London, and Paris, as well as to major exhibitions, including the Venice Biennale.
Mission statement
Our mission is to help collectors navigate the art world and to guide the discovery of pieces that have individual meaning to them. We aim to curate a collection that exhibits consistency, coherence, and a collective dialogue.
We work with aspiring collectors and those looking to build upon established collections, and everyone in between. Our goal is to provide a seamless process for both those who are just beginning to explore the art market and also experienced collectors who value added insight and logistical coordination.
We invite our clients to access our network of relationships and leverage our connoisseurship in advising on artists, quality, provenance, and price.
The art world is constantly changing as trends and styles evolve. We live and breathe this world and believe that it is crucial to remain apprised of exhibitions, events, and other happenings to best advise our clients. We pride ourselves on using this knowledge to find emerging talent before those artists obtain international recognition.
We help collectors navigate the art world effortlessly and transparently for them to visualize and ultimately acquire the collection they desire; we aim to explore varied artistic mediums in a way that encourages a cohesive conversation among the works and their environment.
Through the journey of art collecting, we want to encourage our clients to develop a sensibility towards art and discover their own taste and aesthetic.
