Debra and Leon Black Family Foundation

OVERVIEW: The Leon Black Family Foundation is helmed by billionaire Leon Black, who has a passion for the arts and owns a substantial art collection. Black prefers to dole out money directly to arts institutions himself. Black has connections to many prominent art museums in the New York City area and serves on several boards.

IP TAKE: Most grant seekers will not get far here, but Black is someone to keep an eye on as a serious collector and arts philanthropist in the New York City area.

Leon Black takes much the same approach with his philanthropy that he does with his career. He tries to direct the money where it will do the most good when he funds medical research, especially when it comes to cancer. He also tends to think big when funding arts projects.

Black's interest in health is likely shifting more toward FasterCures, which actually has a Philanthropy Advisory Service (PAS). The PAS teaches philanthropists to “Give Smarter” by joining donors with research interests, taking Black’s sort of “portfolio approach” to funding medical research, so it's a good place to look for innovative research outfits. As far as arts and culture go, again, bold initiatives seem to catch Black's eye, and of course Jewish organizations also have an advantage.

PROFILE: At the beginning, the Debra and Leon Black Family Foundation was a consistent funder of arts institutions of New York City. Leon Black is the son of Eli Black, a prominent Jewish businessman who owned United Brands Company. He attended Dartmouth as an undergrad and did his MBA at Harvard, before going to work on Wall St. at Drexel Burnham Lambert in mergers and acquisitions. After Drexel collapsed in the late 80s, he formed Apollo Global Management. The Blacks move their philanthropy through the Debra and Leon Black Family Foundation, formerly known as the Leon Black Family Foundation. According to available tax filings, the foundation awarded around $5.6 million in grants in 2018.

Black and his wife Debra, who is a producer on Broadway, are two of the most prominent art collectors in the country. A few years ago, Black purchased one of the four existing versions of Munch's The Scream for nearly $120 million, which at the time was the highest price ever paid for a work of art at an auction. Black made The Scream available for public viewing at MoMA, where he also serves a trustee.

Grants for Jewish Causes

The Blacks have sponsored professorships at Dartmouth in Shakespeare and in Jewish Studies, and they gave Yale University Press a healthy sum to launch a 100-book series of biographies of famous Jews, “from Abraham to Bob Dylan.” Black is interested in delineating and preserving a sense of “Jewish continuity” throughout the ages; to this end, the foundation gave Birthright Israel $500,000 in 2017.

One of the few grants coming out of the Debra and Leon Black Family Foundation the last several years has been to the Tony Blair Faith Foundation, which promotes interfaith dialogue. As mentioned above, Black also donates to a number of Jewish organizations.

Grants for the Arts

The Modern Museum of Art has been one of the foundation's consistent grantees, which has received at least $11.45 million over the years.  In 2002, MoMA received nearly $8.6 million. When the foundation was operating on all cylinders, it also doled out money to Public Theatre, the foremost theatrical American producer of Shakespeare, the Metropolitan Museum of Arts and the Museum of Jewish Heritage, where Black serves as a trustee. 

In recent years, though, Black has made individual arts gifts direct to the source. In 2012, Black acquired Phaidon Press, a leading publisher of fine arts books and has bold plans for "geographic expansion." It is a move that shows that those interested in getting Black's attention should focus on the business side of art, not just taking on charity.

As an alumnus of Dartmouth College, Black has also been a heavy arts funder to his college. He has endowed professorships in Shakespearean Studies at the college and also made a $48 million gift to Dartmouth for construction of the Black Family Visual Arts Center, a center that allows film, media studies and studio arts students to study together in the same complex. The center opened in 2012.

Currently, the foundation seems to be in flux and gave just $1.5 million recently to only four grantees, none art related. This makes the foundation a tricky source of funding for arts grant seekers. However, given his intense passion for his art, his long record of giving, and his enormous wealth, Black is someone to keep a close eye on.

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CONTACT:

Debra and Leon Black Family Foundation
445 Park Ave., Ste. 1401
New York, NY 10022-8626