Wright Auction

At the encouragement of painter Elaine de Kooning, Marberger moved to New York to become an art dealer in the late 1960s, when he was just 22 years old. He and de Kooning first met at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, where Marberger was de Kooning’s student and spearheaded efforts to start The Frame, the institution’s student-run gallery. “It was as though we had known each other all our lives,” de Kooning recalled. “It was quite extraordinary. It was instant empathy.” With his wide, infectious smile and prodigious appetite for socializing, Marberger quickly established himself among New York’s artists and collectors; after a brief stint as the assistant dean of the New York Studio School, Marberger was named the first director of the Fischbach Gallery, an esteemed “57th Street gallery row” institution founded by Marilyn Fischbach in 1960.

One of the first galleries to show works by Alex Katz, Fischbach Gallery was initially known as a purveyor of abstract art—in his role as director, the New York Times reported, Marberger “successfully turned the gallery's program from abstract art to contemporary American realism and showed the work of such well-known artists in the field as Jane Freilicher, Nell Blaine, Neil Welliver and John Button.” Indeed, Marberger's personal collection reflects this range of styles, with works from Ronald Bladen, Alex Katz, Raymond Parker, Georg Pfahler, Doug Ohlson, and Robert Swain alongside Wynn Chamberlain, Neil Welliver, and Nancy Hagin, among others.

Though Fischbach was on West 57th Street, Marberger called the West Village home, where he lived at a MacDougal Alley townhouse alongside neighbors, Fischbach artist Jim Touchdon downstairs, and across the hall Lawrence (Larry) DiCarlo, his friend and classmate from Carnegie Mellon who would later join him as an operating partner at Fischbach Gallery. Elaine de Kooning and Marberger’s sister Donna, whom he lovingly referred to as “Baby Donna,” would often stay over on Belgian velvet sofas. Indeed, Marberger worked to bring his passion even closer to home, at one point establishing a downtown satellite of Fischbach on Broom Street that showed avant-garde contemporary works.

As a dealer and gallerist, Marberger channeled his ability to connect with people of all stripes, inside and outside the art world, to create an expanded sphere of influence—even hitting the road with DiCarlo to visit collectors across the American South and Southwest. “I think Aladar saw himself as an ‘art activist,’” recalls Donna Marberger, “taking art beyond 57th street and exposing it to a vast audience, incorporating it into daily living, including corporate businesses, bankers, investment firms, and individuals who had no access to the New York art scene.” One particularly memorable example was Fischbach’s facilitation of Gene Davis’s 1972 public work known as Franklin’s Footpath, a massive outdoor painting of the artist’s signature stripes on the ground leading up to the Philadelphia Museum of Art—at 414 feet in length, it was the world’s largest painting at the time.

A fixture of the Manhattan-centric New York art world, Marberger would also call the Hamptons and, later, the Hudson Valley, his second homes. Whether in the city or its further surrounds, Marberger remained an avid entertainer, frequently hosting parties with the artists whose works he championed, along with friends and family—indeed, Marberger considered the artists we worked with to be like family. He was especially close to the painter Jane Freilicher and her family. “It was personal to Aladar," recalls Donna Marberger, "he cared for all aspects of their lives, since their success was his success, and he loved the challenge. That is what family does, right?” 

"Aladar Marberger was an unforgettable presence in New York," recalls Jane Freilicher's daughter, Elizabeth Hazan. "Bright, generous and dynamic, he commanded every room he entered with the force of his personality. He was a natural raconteur and always came with incredible stories to all my parents’ parties, large and small. As my mother’s long time gallery dealer he became very close to our family. He was incredibly devoted to her, yet had such tremendous energy that he managed to have many close relationships with his artists, and of course with his mentor, Elaine de Kooning. He fought his battle with AIDS with tremendous bravery and found humor even in the darkest of times." 

When Marberger was diagnosed with AIDS in 1985, the parties didn’t stop—for Marberger, the disease became a rallying cry to keep celebrating life, art, and family with verve, as well as an opportunity to help others suffering from the epidemic. At a time when AIDS was considered a death sentence and shrouded in secrecy and silence, Marberger immediately and publicly disclosed his diagnosis, selling art and properties in order to rent an oceanfront house in the Hamptons where he, of course, played the host. In the three years preceding his death in 1988, Marberger spoke to news outlets about AIDS, decrying the harmful effects of the social stigma that surrounded it, and bravely volunteered for experimental treatments.

Shortly after Marberger’s AIDS diagnosis, Elaine de Kooning would paint her stunning series of portraits, including Aladar #3, at her own home in the Hamptons, with the trees outside of her window as backdrop. “There was the sense of the power of his presence against the threat of nothingness,” de Kooning said. “Aladar had this determination, backed by his tremendous vitality.” That vitality, perhaps, was Marberger’s “secret,” a tenacious will to bring love, beauty, and celebration to all that he touched.