6 / 114
6
It is rare for anyone to secure renown and the regard of their peers in two
different fields, but this has certainly been the achievement of Ib Jorgensen.
When Ib opened his Molesworth Street gallery in the early 1990’s he had
already achieved substantial success as a couturier in Dublin, London and in-
ternationally and he worked with a similar focus, ambition and determination
over the next sixteen years to make his mark as a gallerist and art dealer.
From the very beginning Ib created a setting that became a demonstration of
his own personality and taste. Behind the polished and impressively equipped
door on Molesworth Street one stepped into a townhouse where his attention
to countless complex details ensured that pictures were presented to their full
potential in discreetly elegant rooms. In many ways the gallery became the
extension of his home and the exemplar of a Dublin townhouse interior.
Ib’s clients came to know not only his own excellent visual judgement and
instinct, a knowledge of artists honed over many years of collecting and a care
in research and provenance, but also his insistence on a consistently high qual-
ity of presentation. No expense or trouble was spared in his choice of frames.
Pictures acquired from Ib were designed to be the showpieces of the walls they
were to hang on.
His reputation as an art dealer was initially established in the secondary mar-
ket, showing paintings by a wide range of major late nineteenth and twentieth
century artists, predominantly Irish but also with some British or European
works included. Unusually for an Irish gallery he showed at the Olympia Fine
Art and Antiques fair in London on several occasions and this ambition was
The Ib Jorgensen Collection