Miami billionaire and Citadel CEO Ken Griffin has acquired something few private art collectors in the world can claim to own: a rare painting attributed to Leonardo da Vinci and his studio. And instead of keeping it behind the walls of one of his Miami homes, he is sharing it with the public.
The rarely seen work, Madonna of the Yarnwinder, also known as the Lansdowne Madonna, is now hanging at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art, where it is identified as having been loaned by the Kenneth C. Griffin Collection, according to Artnet.
Owned by Miami Citadel CEO Ken Griffin, the rarely seen Madonna of the Yarminder is now hanging at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art. Metropolitan Museum of Art
The Madonna of the Yarnwinder dates to about 1501 and was painted during da Vinci’s mature period. It predates da Vinci’s masterpiece, the Mona Lisa, which he began around 1503.
The painting appeared at the Met with little fanfare or even a press release, but was discovered by the art media last month. It’s evidence, art experts say, that Griffin has added an Italian Renaissance masterpiece to his collection. The Madonna of the Yarnwinder had been privately owned for more than two decades before appearing at the Met.
A Miami stop for painting? 
Ken Griffin, the billionaire founder and CEO of the hedge fund Citadel, has spent more than $700 million amassing real estate in Miami’s financial district. Carl Juste cjuste@miamiherald.com
It is unknown if there are any plans in the works for Griffin to loan the painting to a South Florida museum. A question posed on the topic has not been answered.
Griffin recently lent 10 works by Jean-Michel Basquiat to the Pérez Art Museum Miami for “Basquiat: Figures, Signs, Symbols.”
Franklin Sirmans, director of PAMM, who praised Griffin’s art collection, said the da Vinci is unlikely, for now, to come to the Miami museum.
“We exhibit the works of painters from the last 100 years,” Sirmans said. “This work is from the 1500s. … But never say never.”
Until now, Griffin has been best known for his appetite for modern and postwar masterpieces. He has spent hundreds of millions of dollars on works by Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning, Jasper Johns and Basquiat, helping make him one of the most powerful buyers in the international art market.
The da Vinci broadens that picture, art experts theorize.
Griffin, whose fortune is estimated at about $50 billion, is now entering the far rarer world of Old Masters, where paintings by da Vinci are so scarce that private ownership itself is extraordinary. Only a handful of da Vinci paintings remain in private hands, while most are held by major museums and institutions.
Griffin’s collection already extends well beyond modern art. He owns historic copies of the U.S. Constitution and Apex, a roughly 150-million-year-old Stegosaurus skeleton that he purchased for $44.6 million in 2024.
According to Artnet, Griffin acquired the da Vinci in a private transaction through Christie’s in 2024. The purchase price has not been disclosed. Art experts have estimated that a painting of this significance could be worth about $200 million or more.
If the Madonna of the Yarnwinder is eventually valued in that range, it would rank among the most valuable individual works in Griffin’s collection — and potentially among the most valuable paintings held privately anywhere in the world.
And Griffin has increasingly made his acquisitions available to the public.
David Millar, a spokesman for Citadel, said Griffin provided the following statement about the painting and its loan to the Met:
“I am excited that the Met’s global audience can experience its artistic beauty and genius firsthand,” Griffin said in a statement to the Miami Herald.
The Met is expected to keep the painting on view through 2028. Griffin will then lend it to the Nivaagaard Collection in Nivå, Denmark.
“Leonardo da Vinci is one of the defining artists and thinkers in human history, and the Madonna of the Yarnwinder is an astonishing treasure that continues to inspire both creative imagination and scholarship,” Griffin said in his statement.
A Leonardo in private hands Owned by Miami Citadel CEO Ken Griffin, the rarely seen Madonna of the Yarminder is now hanging at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art. Metropolitan Museum of Art
The painting depicts the Virgin Mary holding the Christ child, who grasps a cross-shaped stick used to wind yarn. The composition exists in two principal versions. The other, known as the Buccleuch Madonna, has long been displayed publicly in Scotland.
Griffin’s version is distinguished by its Alpine landscape in the background.
Its attribution and history have attracted extensive scholarly attention. Between 2002 and 2006, the painting underwent major research and restoration at the Opificio delle Pietre Dure in Florence. Researchers used X-rays and CAT scans to examine what lay beneath the visible surface.
They discovered a hidden detail: a basket of spindles beneath several layers of Leonardo’s characteristic sfumato technique.
The painting was displayed at the Louvre in Paris in 2019 during an exhibition marking the 500th anniversary of da Vinci’s death.
Griffin’s expanding collection
The da Vinci is not Griffin’s only recent Old Master acquisition.
He was also recently revealed as the anonymous buyer of Artemisia Gentileschi’s Self-Portrait as Saint Catherine of Alexandria, which sold for $5.7 million at Christie’s, Artnet said. Both paintings will be on display at the upcoming Denmark exhibit.
For now, visitors to the Met can see what may be one of the world’s most valuable privately owned Renaissance paintings.
The loan also offers a glimpse into the increasingly expansive ambitions of one of the world’s wealthiest collectors.
Luisa Yanez covers real estate and the impact of wealth migration in South Florida for the Miami Herald. In her work, she will be using both traditional reporting and AI tools.