34 PUNCHMAGAZINE.COM {punchline} She attended gallery and museum openings, went to artist studios and art fairs. This led to a “natural networking,” she says. Komal learned that Joan Mitchell had influenced a group of contemporary women artists, all working abstractly: Amy Sillman, Charline Von Heyl, Jacqueline Humphries and Laura Owens. She began to collect their work and get to know them personally, through visits to their studios. “My happiest days are when I can go to a studio and watch art being made,” she says. “It is the best part of collecting: the stories, the person.” Art by these four women takes center stage in the first floor of the home, which is bathed in light and completely neutral in color, allowing the large, boldly colored art works to dominate. Walking from piece to piece, Komal speaks knowledgeably about each one, not in an art-history-lecture sort of way, but from personal experience—from the heart. Starting with what she calls “the cornerstone” of the collection, Joan Mitchell’s Untitled. “For contemporary women artists, she was one of the most influential.” And, Komal laughs, “she was a badass.” But it is not just contemporary women artists who have earned Komal’s admiration. She has a special place in her heart for older women who may not have received the attention they deserve. She cites a small sculpture by Sue where she herself faced limited options for the future. In fact, it was just the opposite. “I was so lucky to have a father who encouraged my interest in a career in computer science. In fact, he mortgaged our family home so that I could attend Stanford University,” she shares. He did this in spite of her uncles’ admonishment that “those funds should be used for her dowry.” She earned a master’s degree at Stanford, and then her MBA at University of California, Berkeley. Her first foray into the arts came in 2011 when Komal joined the board of the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco. She already had an interest in it (her very first acquisition, in 2009, was a painting on paper by Indian artist Rina Banerjee) but found that her innate love of abstract art was leading her in a different direction. “I found that I felt more comfortable with North American artists of my generation,” she says, adding, “I was awestruck the moment I became a crazy collector.” With some guidance from recognized experts in the art world like Gary Garrels, a former curator at SFMOMA, and art historian Mark Godfrey, Komal began the process of learning about contemporary art—and honing her eye in pursuit of her “mission.” PHOTOGRAPHY: COURTESY OF BERKELEY ART MUSEUM AND PACIFIC FILM ARCHIVE - ALEX MARKS / COURTESY BAMPFA ABOVE: Malcolm X #17 by Barbara Chase-Riboud. TOP: A view of the Making Their Mark exhibition, with Simone Leigh’s sculpture Stick in the foreground.
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