Thaddaeus Ropac Takes on Martha Diamond Trust This move signals new attention for the overlooked New York painter

By Daniel Cassady

Thaddaeus Ropac has taken on the trust of Martha Diamond, the New York painter whose cityscapes are admired by artists yet largely under-recognized on the market. The gallery will represent the Martha Diamond Trust in collaboration with David Kordansky, with a first European museum survey set to open at the Sara Hildén Art Museum in Tampere, Finland, in September 2026.

Diamond, who died in 2023 at 79, spent more than six decades developing a body of work that translated the architecture of Manhattan into a distinct visual language. Her canvases, often built from repeated, vertical lines, hover between abstraction and figuration, capturing not the literal skyline so much as its essence.

Ropac, the eponymous dealer, said his interest in the artist grew gradually, prompted first by the enthusiasm of artists he trusted. “I really learned always to listen to your artists when they point out an artist for you,” he said, recalling early conversations with Alex Katz, who spoke “very strongly, very highly” of Diamond’s work.

David Salle, who has followed Diamond’s work for decades, described encountering paintings that felt immediately, almost stubbornly resolved. “It was so clearly right… so declarative in its painterly identity,” he said, adding that their relatively limited audience over the years was “baffling,” given how “obviously good” they seemed.