Solomon R. Guggenheim
Solomon Robert Guggenheim ( born February 2, 1861 in Philadelphia, † November 3, 1949 in New York ) was an American industrialist and philanthropist.
Life
Solomon Robert Guggenheim comes from a Jewish family that had emigrated 1847 from Switzerland to the United States. He was born the son of Meyer Guggenheim on February 2, 1861 in Philadelphia. He was educated at public and private schools in Philadelphia and in Switzerland. Since Solomon R. Guggenheim was a member of the company of the brothers Guggenheim, acting, among other things with copper, he quickly became a millionaire.
After he had made the acquaintance of the German Hilla Rebay von honor meadows, he started at the beginning of the 1930s artworks by modern European artists to collect. He obtained, for example, works by the artist Wassily Kandinsky. 1937 founded the Solomon R. Guggenheim Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation to promote the public understanding of modern art. Two years later, in 1939, the Foundation in New York opened the Museum of Non-Objective Art, which is the collection of the Solomon R. Guggenheim was opened to the public. He commissioned Frank Lloyd Wright in 1943 to design a new museum building on Fifth Avenue. On November 3, 1949 Solomon R. Guggenheim died before the construction of the museum began in 1956. In retrospect, the museum was named in his honor Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum.
Family
Solomon R. Guggenheim married 1895 Irene Rothschild ( 1868-1954 ), daughter of New York merchant Henry Victor Rothschild ( not related to the European Rothschild banking family ) and his wife Josephine (nee Wolf). From the marriage of Solomon and Irene three daughters were born: Eleanor (1896-1992), Gertrude (1898-1966), and Barbara ( 1904-1985 ).
Solomon R. Guggenheim was the uncle of Peggy Guggenheim, whose father, Benjamin Guggenheim, his brother, in 1912, died in the sinking of the Titanic.
By Cédric Guggenheim (* 1981 in Montreux ) the grandson of Solomon R. Guggenheim continues the family heritage. The investor uses a large portion of the family fortune for philanthropic purposes and promoting talented artists and young entrepreneurs.