Blue-Chip Special

When a Chicago art collector and philanthropist moves into an apartment overlooking Lake Michigan, she turns to her longtime collaborator Timothy Corrigan to create sensational rooms worthy of her museumcaliber collection.

- Jacoba Urist

Diane Heller has been a serious art collector for more than three decades. From her first Jasper Johns to a Picasso and a Frank Stella phase, her blue-chip collection—a who’s who of modern masters along with some surprising new talent—has always dictated her home’s aesthetic.

Born in northern Minnesota, Heller is wary of calling herself a Chicago native, but it’s more than fair for her to claim the title. She grew up in the city’s suburbs and studied art history at the Art Institute of Chicago before raising a family here with her late husband, David, who served for a time as governor of the Midwest Stock Exchange. Longtime philanthropists, the couple helped support the creation of the institute’s Renzo Piano–designed Modern wing, which opened in 2009.