Ron and Leslie Rosenzweig's Art-Filled Water Mill Home

The living room, with a monumental painting by Melvin Martinez, an artist the couple discovered while visiting Puerto Rico. Also in view is a portrait of Liz Taylor by Vik Muniz

	The Rosenzweigs in their foyer. Behind the couple is a work by Tauba Auerbach, titled Shattered Glass
	The couple’s Water Mill home

The Water Mill home of Ron and Leslie Rosenzweig is set inland, overlooking Mill Pond and a peaceful wetland. Its exterior exudes a minimal Asian aesthetic: raw cedar wood that glistens silver in the sunlight. “We told the architects two words: Asian contemporary,” says Ron—and the architects, Greifenstein-Boyce Associates, hit the nail on the head. It is unassuming but elegant, contemporary but timeless.

The interior, however, is where the outer Zen gives way to the couple’s inner wild child. While tasteful decorative details are strikingly unique—including Bakelite light fixtures and ceiling fans that could be considered fine-art sculptures—it is the couple’s stunning collection of modern and contemporary art that steals the spotlight. The Rosenzweigs, who spend the winter in Boca Raton, Florida, are regulars at Art Basel Miami Beach, an annual contemporary art fair held in December.

“I always say that I’m just going to look and I’m not going to buy anything, and then I come out and I’ve bought six or eight pieces that have caught my eye,” Leslie admits with a half-guilty, half-smitten smile. “I love the buzz—going early, seeing everyone. When you go to the preview, you’re with people who are passionate about art. And of course, it’s the 10th edition this year, so I’m expecting that they’ll do some fun things.

“We’ve been acquiring so much art over the years that we almost never think of a spot where it will fit,” quips Ron. “We’ll find room.” Artworks, like a Mike Bidlo “Not Pollock” painting (circa 1982), a large-scale painting by young talent Angel Otero, and a Sol LeWitt painting on paper comprising hundreds of colorful wavy lines, dot the walls; occupy windows, like Kirsten Hassenfeld’s delicate and site-specific paper sculpture, installed in a large, street-facing picture window; rest on tabletops—an Allan McCollum installation, Perfect Vehicles, of identical monochrome vases; or take over the floors, as is the case with Do Ho Suh’s witty “welcome” mat that reads AWAY.

The Building of an Art Collection
The couple has always possessed an artistic bent. Ron dabbled in art before going to engineering school, while Leslie followed her political science degree from Berkeley with one in interior design, but it wasn’t until the 1980s that they really caught the collecting fever. “We had been buying art but not with a focus—some African and Native American pieces, some Color Field works; it was a mixture. But then when we got involved with the New Museum, we began collecting work by young, emerging contemporary artists,” explains Ron, who, together with his wife, has been actively involved with the museum, in Manhattan, since its inception at the New School in 1977 (he has also been a trustee for the past 10 years). It has since become one of the leading contemporary art museums in the world.