Michelle C Quinn

MCQ Fine Art, LLC
Private Art Consultant

Over the past 25 years, Michele C Quinn, has built a career as a gallerist and private art consultant, specializing in post-war and contemporary art. Michele has served as curatorial advisor for some the largest private and corporate contemporary art collections in the United States.

After a successful art career in New York City, working for high profile institutions such as Christie’s, Sotheby’s, Brooke Alexander and Gemini GEL at Joni Weyl, Michele returned to her childhood residence of Las Vegas in 2003 to explore new opportunities for her contemporary art interests, where she broke new ground elevating the city’s status as a cultural arts destination.

Through the years, Michele Quinn/MCQ FINE ART has served as the art consultant to several major corporate collections including Wynn Resorts, MGM Resorts and Station Casinos. From 2006-2010, Michele proposed and developed the $40 million art program for MGM Resorts. Since 2014 she has led multiple large-scale projects for HINES, a privately owned global real estate investment, development and management firm. More recently, in 2018 she was recruited to be the Senior Advisor to Paul G Allen and his multi-million-dollar fine art collection under the Vulcan, Inc umbrella.

Her knowledge of the global art market, longstanding resources and worldwide contacts allowed Michele to successfully commission works by, Maya Lin, Jenny Holzer, Nancy Rubins, and Richard Long, while collaborating with such world-renowned architects and designers as Pelli Clarke Pelli Architects, Rockwell Group and Studio Daniel Libeskind. She has developed multiple Public Art installations with HINES in Chicago, San Francisco and Calgary Canada, including a large outdoor installation by Japanese artist, Yayoi Kusama in San Francisco and Donald Sultan in San Mateo CA.

In 2015-2016, Michele co-curated Tilting the Basin: Contemporary Art of Nevada, an exhibition showcasing the most significant contemporary artists living and working across Nevada today. Tilting the Basin bridges the divide between Northern and Southern Nevada communities, providing a broad overview and deep understanding of the most accomplished work being created by more than thirty artists living and working in the Silver State. The exhibition was on view at the Nevada Museum of Art in Reno, and then again in a pop-up warehouse in Downtown Las Vegas.

Her private client roster includes several of ArtNews’ Top 100 Collectors, to the younger more emerging collector, while focusing on mid-career to established, blue-chip artists represented by reputable galleries and museums worldwide. In 2018 Michele was recruited to become the Director of Art Collections for Vulcan, Inc (aka The Paul G. Allen Family Collection) overseeing a large scale, multi-genre art, artifacts and pop-culture memorabilia collection, considered to be one of the largest and most important art collections of our time. The Director position was to provide the overall guidance of the Collection, in response to the owners’ goals and specific instructions, but to also maintain a high-level current market understanding and art industry professionalism in its decision-making process. With the unfortunate and untimely passing of Mr. Allen in October 2018, Michele re-engaged with MCQ FINE ART full time and returned to her home in Las Vegas.

Michele is a certified member of the Women’s Business Enterprise (WBENC), is a previous board member and current member of the Association of Professional Art Advisors (APAA), an international organization of leading independent art advisors and corporate art curators and has been a member of ArtTable, the leadership organization for Professional Women in the Arts for more than 15 years. She has also served on the Board of Directors for the Art Museum at Symphony Park, (AMSP) and transitioned to the Board of Trustees for the Nevada Museum of Art (NMA) in 2018 when those two entities merged. From 2018-2020 she served on the NMA Las Vegas Committee, Search Committee and was Co-Chair of the Collections Committee.

In 2020, Michele completed the Comprehensive Appraisal Studies Program through the Appraisal Institute of America, now acting as an Associate Appraiser and is able to provide USPAP complaint appraisals (2021-2022)