When your home becomes a gallery: an art-filled mansions in Mallorca

Photographs Neus Pastor

It’s a sunny, stiflingly hot morning in late summer when we meet, but the artists are both dressed all in black. Vu wears a geometric Issey Miyake handbag; Jakober a fetching Panama hat. We sit for coffee under a parasol and talk about the weeks ahead. “Very busy,” says Vu. The diary is packed with visits by curators and gallerists, there are exhibitions to prep. This isn’t just any normal home. For years, much of the property has been given over to Vu and Jakober’s foundation and public museum, and it brims with artworks.

There was a time in the mid-90s when this was simply a family house where the couple was surrounded by their children and friends. Vu and Jakober had studios here, too, where they worked both separately first, and together later. But the art eventually took over. Their penchant for collecting began with their obsession with children’s portraits from the 16th to 19th centuries (they now have 165, from Spain, France, Germany, Italy and beyond). In the end, the habit pushed them out of their own bedrooms and dining rooms. “Collecting is a confidence thing,” says Vu, reflecting on over half a century of acquiring art. “No,” Jakober chips in, “it’s an illness.”

Artworks are crammed into every room and tessellated on every wall. “Horror vacui,” says Vu, referring to their fear of empty spaces. There’s everything from paintings by Aboriginal artist Emily Kam Kngwarray to 3m-high wooden statues from Cameroon, self-portraits by Meret Oppenheim and ceramic figures from the Rif mountains, all held together by the house itself, a conspicuous presence that has led the two to refer to this place as a “gesamtkunstwerk” – the Wagnerian idea of a “total work of art”.

When the couple bought the house in 1978, it looked very different. “It was an old farm – an improbable amalgamation of styles, and not great,” says Vu. But the duo saw its charm and set about finding someone who could redesign it in the way they imagined. Leafing through a French architecture magazine, they chanced upon the perfect candidate: Hassan Fathy. Jakober called the magazine’s editor, a friend, to ask how he could be connected to the Egyptian architect, and a meeting was arranged.

Fathy visited the site in Mallorca, on a little promontory just west of the Medieval town of Alcúdia, and the owners presented their vision for an overhaul. “He said, ‘It’s nice, but I think I can do better,’” laughs Jakober. The result, completed in 1980, is Fathy’s only project in Europe, displaying all the trademark signs of his North African vernacular and the traditional building techniques he favoured.

The house’s Arab-inflected aesthetic – its lancet windows, latticed woodwork and heavy patterned doors – also reflects Mallorca’s own history and intermingling of cultures. Jakober and Vu are intrigued by the idea of different traditions running parallel to one another, which is why the foundation features a “confluence” room of artefacts sourced from all around the world. But the crested outer walls of the house also echo Vu’s previous residence on the island, S’Estaca, where she used to live with her first husband, Italian painter Domenico Gnoli, who died in 1970 aged just 36.

Inside the museum, a room is dedicated to Gnoli’s work, alongside one for Vu’s father, the renowned Vietnamese painter Vu Cao Dam. As the couple’s collection has grown, the property has morphed to accommodate it. The house’s water reservoir has been converted into an exhibition space. A further subterranean gallery was added later, and there’s also a vast sculpture park dotted with the couple’s own monumental sculptures, many of them inspired by mythological animals from Japan and Egypt.

Vu and Jakober have backed themselves into a corner of the house, a few small rooms and a kitchen, where Jakober laughingly says they are “allowed” to live. Through the entrance hall – hung with portraits of the duo by artists including Hassan Hajjaj and Lord Snowdon – a solid door leads to the kitchen. Here, colourful Andalusian-style patterned tiles take pride of place on the walls (a hint to the smaller tiles that cheerfully accent the floor of the whole house). The double-level library might now also be open to the public, but Jakober still loves to spend time there and says he has leafed through all 10,000 volumes on the shelves.

When they host dinners, Jakober and Vu use the long table underneath the portico that looks out on to the house’s internal courtyard. With its twinkling fountains, Islamic-inspired geometries and lush palms, it feels like something straight out of the Alhambra. There’s also a recessed area clad in terracotta. “We used this space like a theatre: people would sit in the pit and look at the action in front,” says Jakober, taking a fleeting glimpse back. “We had a great time,” says Vu. “But life moves on.”

Jakober takes on a serious tone when he talks about the future of the foundation. “I hope it will have a happy ending. When we have gone on to a better life, we hope it can continue,” he says. “It’s encouraging to see that we are doing something that makes people happy.” For now, though, there are meetings to organise, patrons to receive, visitors to host. “I never particularly liked holidays, even when I was a child,” adds Vu with a smile. “I always just wanted to do things.”