Berman, Merrill C.

Merrill C. Berman (born 1938) is a New York-based art collector. Over almost fifty years, Berman has built a major collection of early 20th century Russian and European art and graphic design. According to Linda Shearer, former Director of the Williams College Museum of Art, and Dianne H. Pilgrim, former Director of the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum, Smithsonian Institution, “The Merrill C. Berman Collection represents an exemplary effort to collect printed ephemera with an eye for both its aesthetic and its social significance. The collection is replete with masterpieces of graphic design created by some of the most influential artists of the [twentieth] century as well as with pieces by unknown designers whose work has been rescued from oblivion by Merrill Berman’s keen eye.” In addition to deep early 20th century holdings by well-known artists such as Hannah Höch, El Lissitzky, and Aleksandr Rodchenko, Berman has also long collected the work of less familiar members of the avant-garde, as well as cause-oriented material. “Merrill C. Berman may be the most important collector you never heard of,” notes art historian Jane Kallir. In 2017, The Museum of Modern Art, New York made a "transformative" acquisition from the Merrill C. Berman Collection, comprising over 300 early 20th century works. An exhibition based on the acquisition, "Engineer, Agitator, Constructor: The Artist Reinvented," was on view from December 13, 2020 to April 10, 2021. A major catalogue was published.