John Paul Nichols

With more than two dozen years of top management posts in the industries of vacation ownership and international hotel development, John Paul Nichols has had abundant opportunities to travel and collect folk art.

Over the past two decades, he has served as President, Chief Executive Officer, or Senior Vice President for various Cendant Corporation entities, including HFS and Wingate Inns International, Inc., and subsequently companies under the umbrella of RCI, such as RCI International and RCI Latin American and Caribbean. These assignments allowed John Paul Nichols the chance to live in Mexico, China, the United Kingdom, and many other places. His areas of responsibility have ranged from the regions of Asia and Africa to Europe and South America. During his travels, John Paul Nichols has purchased folk art pieces and other works centered on religious subjects. His collection of furniture favors mid-century modern designs.

During a yearlong stint in Beijing, where he filled the post of President and CEO of RCI International directing a newly created corporate region that encompassed Asia, Africa, and Latin America, John Paul Nichols became fascinated by the work of contemporary Chinese artists. Recently, the Chinese government has loosened its control over foreigners’ purchase of artwork by local artists, which allowed pieces to come on the market not only in Beijing and Hong Kong, but in New York as well.

Thus, John Paul Nichols collected the work of Wang Guangyi, a pioneer of the Chinese Political Pop movement who combines images from the Cultural Revolution with those of United States consumer brands and national icons. John Paul Nichols acquired Guangyi's sculpture "Materialist (man)" and oil-on-canvas painting "Great Criticism - Disney." Mr. Nichols also owns a life-size resin statue from Zhang Dali’s “Offspring” series as well as Dali’s “AK-47 H-6.”
No stranger to overseas life or foreign languages, John Paul Nichols spent part of his youth growing up in Chile and Brazil, and he later attended two years of college in Spain. As a consequence of these formative experiences, he is fluent in Spanish and Portuguese.