Leverage, 2024. Single-channel video installation, color, sound. 18:27 min. 

Between 2013 and 2019, Daniel Sundheim, billionaire investor and trustee of the Museum of Modern Art, filed 12 loan documents with the New York Secretary of State. These loan filings provide a window into Sundheim’s spending habits: he was using his art collection as collateral for loans, which he used to buy more art, which, in turn, became collateral for more loans, and so on - collateral, loan and asset feeding into each other in a self-reinforcing loop. 

Leverage is a single-channel video installation, projected on the ground. It the first chapter in an ongoing project that traces the history of the financialization of art. Leverage is a portrait of Daniel Sundheim, a prominent investor and art collector, told through the story of his art-backed loans. Set against the backdrop of the current art market downturn, Leverage is also a story about debtors and creditors, interest rates, international fugitives and transactional friendships.