Top 200 Collectors

“Money,” Stephen A. Wynn has said, “is a way of expressing no compromise.” That statement is just as true for Wynn’s art collection as it is for the multi-billion-dollar Las Vegas casinos that bear his name.

In 2005, his collection of 19th- and 20th-century masterpieces was valued between $300 million and $400 million, and included Jan Vermeer’s Young Woman Seated at a Virginal (ca. 1670). At the time, it was one of only two Vermeer paintings in private hands. He has since sold the Vermeer, as well as other top works—in 2005, hedge-fund billionaire Steven A. Cohen reportedly paid Wynn approximately $120 million for Vincent van Gogh’s Peasant Woman Against a Background of Wheat (1890) and Paul Gauguin’s Bathers (1902)—but his art collection is now thought to be worth $1 billion.

Wynn stepped down as CEO of Wynn Resorts in 2018 after allegations of sexual misconduct, which he denied. But later that same year, he launched Sierra Fine Art LLC, an online art gallery advertising works created by eye-catching names, including Matisse, Picasso, and Warhol. Wynn’s lawyer Michael Kosnitzky told Artnet News that the former CEO “has decided to do something in a businesslike way that would keep him active. He plans to travel around the world to locate art of significance and use his vast experience and knowledge to sell it to others.” The new company was reportedly the buyer of Monet’s Nymphéas en fleur (ca. 1914–17), purchased for $84.7 million at Christie’s New York in 2018. At the time of the sale, the work set a new record for the artist at auction. 

It was not the only time that Wynn had been the subject of controversy. In 2022, the U.S. State Department sued Wynn, alleging that he had sought a diplomatic favor from the Trump administration in order to protect his business interests in Macau. He denied the allegations.

In addition to the high-valued art in his collection, Wynn also owns major pieces of pricey real estate—and has sold them just as frequently, too. In 2015, he paid $47.9 million on a Beverly Hills home owned by Maurice Marciano, the Guess co-founder who was listed on the Top 200 for several years. And two years later, he sold a Bel-Air home for $16.55 million. More recently, in June 2020, he put his 13,500-square-foot Las Vegas villa on the market for $25 million (after a $16 million renovation).