Gunter Sachs

Gunter Sachs, a wealthy German-born art collector who was fodder for gossip columns in the 1960s for his playboy antics and his brief marriage to Brigitte Bardot, died Saturday at his home in the Swiss Alpine resort of Gstaad. He was 78.

His family said Sachs, who had an incurable degenerative disease, committed suicide.

Once referred to as “the German Lothario” by Time magazine, Sachs became a well-known figure in the art world. His collection included works by Magritte, Kandinsky, Francis Bacon and Max Ernst as well as Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein and Tom Wesselmann.

Warhol, a close friend of Sachs’, produced portraits of him and Bardot.

In May 2006, Sachs sold Warhol’s silk screen of Bardot at auction for $3 million.

In his wilder days, Parisian dailies called him “Saxy.” And when he married Bardot (his second wife) in July 1966 a few weeks after they met, Newsweek labeled it a “Franco-German alliance” and wrote of Sachs’ reputation as “a big lady killer.” The marriage ended three years later.