Alec Wildenstein, 67, Art Dealer, Horseman in Scandalous Divorce
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
Alec Wildenstein, who died February 17 in Paris, was a horse racing and art gallery mogul with few peers in either of those worlds. But he burst upon the New York scene in 1997 for the tabloid divorce of the decade, a tale shot through with bad behavior and pathologies of wealth including multiple mistresses, compulsive shopping, and face-lifts gone haywire.
It was the plastic surgery that gave the story its particular zest, illustrated by the cat-eyed Jocelyne Wildenstein: She had done it all for him, she insisted, transforming her face into a cat’s to keep her man’s interest as she aged. The grotesque result led to the memorable headline: “Bride of Wildenstein.” Along the way, Alec Wildenstein pleaded guilty to threatening his wife with a 9-mm pistol reportedly while dressed only in a towel and accompanied by an unnamed nude 19-year-old.
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