Jeffrey Gundlach is sharing his famous love of modern art with his hometown.

Jeffrey Gundlach DoubleLine Capital Chief Executive Officer

The high-profile, billionaire chief of Los Angeles-based DoubleLine [profile] is himself a native Buffalonian, and he's pledging $42.5 million to the Buffalo art museum, the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, where he "learned about art" as a kid. And Gundlach's name will become part of the museum's brand; it will rebrand as the Albright-Knox Gundlach Art Museum.

Gundlach made his pledge in the form of matching contributions from other individual donors and from government. On Friday the museum's director, Janne Sirien, revealed that in three months the whirlwind AK360 campaign, which includes Gundlach's pledge, has already reached $103 million of their $125-million goal, which will fund both the museum's physical expansion and an expansion of its endowment.

Bloomberg, Buffalo Business First, the Buffalo News (twice!), and the New York Times all covered Gundlach's contribution to the museum.

"The museum should say Buffalo on it, for goodness sake," Gundlach tells the Times. "It's probably the greatest cultural treasure in Buffalo."

Gundlach is famously a fan of Piet Mondrian and other modern artists. The DoubleLine name was inspired by Mondrian, and four years ago some of Gundlach's modern art was stolen and then recovered. 

Edited by: Neil Anderson, Managing Editor


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