A Triceratops Skull, a Marc Quinn Sculpture, and a Tapestry the Louvre Also Owns

In October 2006, Steve Wynn stood in front of a Picasso painting at his Las Vegas resort and put his elbow through it. The painting was Le Rêve, a 1932 portrait of Picasso's mistress Marie-Thérèse Walter. Wynn had agreed to sell it the day before for $139 million, which would have made it the most expensive artwork ever sold. He was showing it to a group of friends that included Nora Ephron, Barbara Walters, and art dealer Serge Sorokko when he turned, gesticulated, and punctured the canvas with his right elbow. "Oh shit, look what I've done," he reportedly said.

The painting was repaired. Steve Cohen eventually bought it for $155 million in 2013, making it one of the most expensive private art sales in history. Wynn used the proceeds to acquire more Picassos and an Andy Warhol. He later called himself "the Clouseau of art collecting" on 60 Minutes.

That anecdote matters because it establishes something about Wynn Resorts that the casino floor and the room count do not: this is a company that has been acquiring, displaying, damaging, repairing, and selling major artworks for three decades. The Wynn Las Vegas gallery once displayed a Rembrandt self-portrait from 1634 and the only painting by Johannes Vermeer in private hands. The resort was originally going to be named Le Rêve, after the Picasso, until anti-French sentiment in the US during the Iraq War made a French name inadvisable.

Now a $5.1 billion Wynn resort is opening on a man-made island in the Arabian Gulf. It has an art collection. And the centrepiece is not a painting.

66 Million Years Old, Inside a Casino

The National reported in December 2025 that Wynn Al Marjan Island's collection includes a 66-million-year-old Triceratops skull. The Triceratops was a herbivorous dinosaur that lived during the late Cretaceous period across what is now North America. It went extinct 66 million years ago when an asteroid struck the Yucatan Peninsula and ended the Mesozoic Era.

The skull will go on permanent display inside the resort when it opens in spring 2027. No details have been published about its provenance, acquisition price, or specific display location within the building, but The National confirmed it will be part of the collection visible across the resort's public spaces, guest areas, and rooms.

A Triceratops skull in a casino resort is an unusual choice, and that is the point. Wynn's Las Vegas art collection was rooted in European painting: Picasso, Rembrandt, Vermeer, Matisse, Renoir. The RAK collection starts not with human art but with natural history. A 66-million-year-old fossil predates the invention of painting by about 65.96 million years. It predates the invention of gambling by roughly the same margin. Placing it inside the Middle East's first casino resort is a statement about what this building considers worth preserving and displaying. The choice to anchor the collection in paleontology rather than portraiture signals that Wynn Al Marjan Island is positioning itself as something other than a Las Vegas export. The RAK vs Las Vegas comparison covers the operational differences between the two properties. The art tells a different story entirely.

Marc Quinn's Light Into Life: From Kew Gardens to the Arabian Gulf

Marc Quinn is a British contemporary artist born in 1964 who first came to prominence as part of the Young British Artists movement in the early 1990s. His most famous work, Self (1991), is a self-portrait cast from ten pints of his own frozen blood, kept in a refrigerated display case. He makes a new version every five years. Self (2006) is owned by the National Portrait Gallery in London.

His public commissions include Alison Lapper Pregnant (2005), a 15-ton marble sculpture of a pregnant disabled woman that stood on the Fourth Plinth in Trafalgar Square and was later reinflated as a colossal sculpture called Breath for the 2012 Paralympics opening ceremony. He made Siren (2008), a solid gold sculpture of Kate Moss displayed at the British Museum. His work sits in permanent collections at the Tate, the Metropolitan Museum, the Guggenheim, SFMOMA, the Centre Pompidou, the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, and the Fondazione Prada in Milan.

In 2024, Quinn presented Light Into Life at Kew Gardens in London, a major exhibition of over 20 monumental sculptures exploring the relationship between humans and plants. The exhibition included five-metre mirrored stainless steel orchids, bronze bonsai trees freed from their human pruning to reach full natural height, and herbarium-inspired abstract sculptures representing plants used in drug discovery. It was one of the largest site-specific art projects Kew had ever hosted.

Wynn Al Marjan Island has commissioned a "specially commissioned Light Into Life sculpture" from Quinn. The exact form and scale have not been revealed. What we know is that the commission shares its name with the Kew exhibition, which means it likely draws from Quinn's nature-humanity body of work: sculptures that examine what happens when human desire, preservation, and destruction collide with the natural world.

Place that sculpture inside a resort built on a man-made island in the Arabian Gulf, surrounded by reclaimed land, artificial beaches, and transplanted tropical landscaping, and the resonance is obvious. Quinn has spent his career making art about the gap between what nature produces and what humans do with it. A luxury resort on an artificial island is that gap made architectural.

A 17th-Century Tapestry with Counterparts at the Louvre and the Met

The third headline piece in the collection is a 17th-century wool-and-silk tapestry measuring 10 metres. The National reported that counterparts of this tapestry are held at the Louvre Museum in Paris and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

No additional details have been published about the tapestry's specific subject matter, workshop of origin, or acquisition history. What we can say is that a 10-metre tapestry from the 1600s with companion pieces in two of the world's most prestigious museums is a museum-grade acquisition. Tapestries of this provenance typically originate from workshops in France (Gobelins, Beauvais) or Flanders (Brussels, Antwerp), and surviving examples with known institutional counterparts are rare on the private market.

The placement of a 17th-century European textile inside a 21st-century Gulf resort is another deliberate contrast. The tapestry represents a period when European craft traditions were at their peak. The resort it hangs in represents a period when the Gulf is building cultural infrastructure at a pace that rivals or exceeds anything Europe produced in the same timeframe. The tapestry connects the building to a tradition. The building itself breaks from it.

What the Collection Tells You About the Building

Beyond the three headline pieces, The National reported that the hotel will boast "a sizable collection of art, antiquities and artefacts" on display throughout public spaces, guest areas, and rooms. The use of "antiquities" in the plural suggests pieces beyond the Triceratops skull and the tapestry. The use of "artefacts" suggests objects from specific historical or cultural traditions.

Todd-Avery Lenahan's 200-person design team would have been involved in the placement and integration of these works. Lenahan's "veiling and revealing" philosophy, where no single vantage point shows the full building, applies to art as well: you will encounter pieces as you move through the resort, not in a dedicated gallery you choose to enter or skip. This is consistent with how Wynn Las Vegas eventually deployed its collection. The original Wynn gallery closed in 2006, and the artworks were moved into the registration area and corridors. Le Rêve hung above Steve Wynn's breakfast table. The art became part of the building, not separate from it.

The RAK collection seems to follow the same principle. There is no mention of a dedicated gallery. The art lives in the spaces where the guests live. You encounter a 66-million-year-old skull on the way to dinner. You pass a Marc Quinn sculpture walking to the pool. A 10-metre tapestry hangs in a corridor you did not plan to walk through.

The Original InsightThe centrepiece of a $5.1 billion casino resort's art collection is not a painting. It is a 66-million-year-old fossil. The choice to anchor a Gulf resort in paleontology rather than portraiture is a statement about what kind of institution Wynn is building in the Middle East. The Las Vegas collection was European paintings: Picasso, Vermeer, Rembrandt. The RAK collection starts before human civilisation existed. It says: this building thinks in longer timescales than the industry it belongs to.

From the Bellagio Gallery to Le Rêve: Wynn's Three-Decade Art Strategy

Steve Wynn began collecting seriously in the mid-1990s. He believed art would "permanently alter the legacy of Las Vegas," and he was right. The Bellagio (built in 1998 for $1.1 billion, then the most expensive hotel in the world) was the first Las Vegas resort to integrate a public art gallery into the guest experience. Wynn Las Vegas continued the approach with a dedicated gallery that charged admission and reportedly drew 200 to 400 visitors per day on weekends.

The Wynn Las Vegas collection included Le Rêve (Picasso, 1932, purchased at Christie's in 1997 for $48.4 million), a Rembrandt self-portrait from 1634, the only painting by Vermeer in private hands, Matisse's The Persian Robe, and Renoir's Among the Roses. Wynn Resorts paid Steve Wynn a $1 annual lease for the art, with the company covering insurance and security.

After Le Rêve was sold to Cohen in 2013, Wynn used the proceeds to acquire Le Marin (another Picasso from the same Ganz collection), additional canvasses, and an Andy Warhol. In a 2013 interview, Wynn said: "I love Pablo Picasso's work. I think at this point I have a pretty good sense of Picasso, the market, the artist and his life's work. I know pretty much all there is to know about each period of his life, and who owns each picture that's really important."

The RAK collection represents the next chapter. Steve Wynn no longer runs the company (he departed in 2018), but the institutional commitment to art as part of the resort experience has survived the leadership change. The Triceratops skull, the Marc Quinn commission, and the Louvre-connected tapestry are not the personal collection of one man displayed in a hotel. They are acquisitions made by a company that has learned, over 30 years, that art changes how guests perceive the building around them.

What Has Not Been Revealed

Most of the collection remains undisclosed. The three headline pieces (Triceratops skull, Marc Quinn sculpture, tapestry) were mentioned in The National's coverage but without detailed provenance, valuation, or installation photography. The broader collection of "art, antiquities and artefacts" has not been itemised. The total number of pieces, the acquisition budget, the mix of contemporary versus historical work, and the extent to which the collection will be visible to non-guests visiting the resort's restaurants and public areas are all unknown.

Wynn Resorts has historically been deliberate about revealing its art holdings. The Las Vegas gallery opened with the resort, generated significant press coverage, and then quietly closed. The art was redistributed throughout the building. The RAK resort will likely follow a similar pattern: a coordinated reveal around the spring 2027 opening, with the collection disclosed piece by piece as part of the broader marketing programme.

For visitors planning what the trip will cost, the budget guide covers pricing across all categories. What we can say with certainty is that the three confirmed pieces represent museum-grade acquisitions in three different categories (natural history, contemporary sculpture, historical textile), displayed inside a resort where only 4% of the building is casino. The other 96% includes the spaces where this art will live.

Frequently Asked Questions

What art is on display at Wynn Al Marjan Island?

Confirmed pieces include a 66-million-year-old Triceratops skull, a specially commissioned Light Into Life sculpture by British artist Marc Quinn, and a 17th-century wool-and-silk tapestry whose counterparts are held at the Louvre and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The full collection has not been disclosed.

Who is Marc Quinn?

A British contemporary artist (born 1964), member of the Young British Artists movement. Known for Self (frozen blood self-portrait, 1991), Alison Lapper Pregnant (Fourth Plinth, Trafalgar Square, 2005), Siren (solid gold Kate Moss sculpture, British Museum, 2008), and Light Into Life (Kew Gardens, 2024). Work in collections at Tate, Met, Guggenheim, Centre Pompidou.

Is the Triceratops skull real?

Yes. It is a genuine 66-million-year-old fossil from the late Cretaceous period. It will be on permanent display inside the resort.

Where will the art be displayed?

Throughout the resort's public spaces, guest areas, and rooms. There is no mention of a dedicated gallery. The collection is integrated into the building, consistent with how Wynn Las Vegas eventually deployed its own art.

Does Wynn have an art history?

Yes. Steve Wynn has collected art for three decades. The Wynn Las Vegas gallery displayed Picasso, Rembrandt, Vermeer, Matisse, and Renoir. The Bellagio Gallery of Fine Art, which Wynn created, was the first public art gallery inside a Las Vegas resort.

What is the tapestry's provenance?

The tapestry is described as a 17th-century wool-and-silk work measuring 10 metres, with counterparts at the Louvre and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The specific workshop, subject, and acquisition history have not been disclosed.

Can non-guests see the art?

Not confirmed, but likely. At Wynn Las Vegas, the art is visible in public areas including the registration lobby. The RAK resort's restaurants and shopping areas are expected to be accessible to non-guests.

Will the collection grow after opening?

Unknown, but Wynn's history suggests the collection will evolve. Steve Wynn regularly acquired and traded pieces throughout his tenure. The company has shown willingness to adjust its art holdings over time.

Steve Wynn called himself the Clouseau of art collecting after putting his elbow through a Picasso. The painting survived. The sale went through at a higher price seven years later. And the company he built kept collecting art long after he left. The Triceratops skull in Ras Al Khaimah is 66 million years older than anything Wynn ever hung on a wall in Las Vegas. It comes from a period when the Arabian Gulf was a shallow sea, Al Marjan Island did not exist, and the concept of a casino was 65.9 million years in the future. That it will be displayed inside one is either absurd or perfect, depending on how long a view you take.