By Elizabeth Roland

Art and sports don’t mix. That is, they didn’t—until Amar’e Stoudemire decided to burn the dying stereotype to the ground and build a seriously impressive art collection atop the ashes inside of his 14,555 square foot Miami palace fit for a king.

According to an article on Artsy, the 6’11 former NBA star was introduced to his passion for art after receiving a painted portrait of himself holding a menorah, the bible, and a basketball for his twenty-fourth birthday.

Rob Pruitt’s 2011 “Pandas”—Glitter and enamel on canvas.

Five years later he made his first purchase, one of Rob Pruitt’s panda paintings, a deep step into territory teeming with vast amounts of art to be collected and curated. Since that fateful day, his collection has accumulated more than seventy pieces, including a print by the lateJean-Michel Basquiat and a piece by Basquiat’s famous acquaintance Andy Warhol, leaving his mansion walls oozing artistic genius.

Stoudemire has always followed his gut, and despite the banal belief that athletes possess nothing more than a desire to sweat with the best, he’s become an avid art collector with an eye for fashion. He’s collaborated on a fashion line with designer Rachel Roy, and has made an impression on the editor-in-chief at the American magazine Vogue, Anna Wintour, who’s been spotted sitting courtside at his games and aside him in the front row at fashion shows.

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