“We are here to give emotions and memories of unique moments to all those who love exclusivity and a concept of luxury different from the norm.”
A true event begins the moment a person stops being just a guest and becomes part of a carefully orchestrated emotional experience.
Maxim Berin is an entrepreneur in the high-level musical entertainment and event industry, producer and founder of the Big Art Festival (a flagman project of Berin Iglesias Art Holding group), a traveling concert series with gala dinners and scenic performances that are a pure concentration of fashion, international big names, astonishment, harmony, and uncompromised luxury. But what mainly distinguishes Berin is his philosophy and way of thinking, which is conceptually different from all other organizations in this segment, known as the approach, the emotionality that — for those fortunate enough to experience his evenings — stays with them for a long time, especially after having experienced the live and direct experiences created by him.
Often present at the most important fashion weeks in the world, Berin is also an expert and refined connoisseur of fashion, producing very elegant shows, in which the haute couture garments of the most important fashion houses are often the center of the evening thanks to the guests who wear them and his very famous and media-impactful red carpet appearances on the stages of the most prestigious locations.
But what truly defines Berin – in addition to being considered a man of great class and impeccable sartorial style – is his philosophy and way of thinking, which is conceptually different from all other organizations in this segment, known as the approach, the emotionality that — for those fortunate enough to experience his evenings — stays with them for a long time, especially after having experienced the live and direct experiences created by him.
For many years, the leader of Berin Iglesias Art has lived and worked in Monaco, one of the world’s main centers of luxury lifestyle, private capital, and international cultural diplomacy. And while lighting, music, attention to detail, direction, rhythm, and gala dinner service are important to him, what the audience manages to perceive of certain atmospheres is even more so: “more precious things that cannot be bought, but can only be felt.”
In the world of luxury entertainment, almost everything revolves around the big stars, extraordinary budgets, guest lists, and the endless flashes of cameras on the red carpet. Yet, there are very rare individuals who operate on a completely different level—not through spectacle, but through the feeling that remains within the soul for hours, days, sometimes even years after the evening has ended. Mr. Maxim is one of these, visionary and enlightened, meticulous but also incurably romantic, in tune with the times and far-sighted like few others in Europe, and moreover in a sector (that of luxury) where a new language is being sought: no longer ostentatious or performative, but silent, refined, and deeply emotional. A universe where art ceases to be a decoration of life and becomes its architecture. He knows all this! And he is fully aware of it.
The gala evenings of the Big Art Festival take place in the most incredible places on the planet, at the Rosewood in Hong Kong during Art Basel, in the legendary settings of Courchevel and St. Moritz, along the coast of Portofino, in Monte Carlo, Dubai, New York, Porto Cervo, Forte dei Marmi, and in many other destinations across the continents.
Among his guests are people accustomed to the best the world has to offer: owners of international family offices, CEOs of private banking circles, heirs of royal dynasties, founders of global companies, investors, patrons of the arts, leaders of luxury brands, and those for whom cultural capital has long become more important than demonstrative status. It is an audience that has seen almost everything and therefore perceives authenticity, sophistication, and true taste with extraordinary precision.
And if there is one thing in which Maxim Berin excels more than anyone else, it is transforming an event into an emotional architecture of memory.
Mr. Berin, Is Everything Ready for Summer ’26? What Can We Expect from the Big Art Festival?
An extremely exciting summer is anticipated without ever repeating ourselves from the past. Different atmospheres and sensations, always new aesthetics and styles. Each event is a unique and indelible memory. One of the most beautiful moments of the season will be the Big Art Festival in Samarkand with Craig David, a project where everything aligns perfectly: the history of the place, the energy of the city, the music, the summer air, the architecture, the people.
Samarkand is a city of extraordinary historical depth that is returning to being an international attraction. Hosting a major outdoor summer event there with Craig David is incredibly symbolic and wonderful.
Then New York, for the second consecutive year, where we are producing a major event during FIFA Week. A fantastic mix of international business, sports, entertainment, and media. And this year we will have 50 Cent in concert. Followed by Monaco with Mumiy Troll. A rare combination of Mediterranean lightness, old-world elegance, and a sense of splendid European freedom. But one of the most ambitious and exciting projects of the summer will be in Italy, magical Italy, in Porto Cervo in Sardinia, with Robbie Williams. An unforgettable setting.
We are not talking about a simple artist, but a force of nature, who knows how to engage the audience like few others in the world. And for this event, scheduled for August 9th, we are preparing a highly cinematic concept for the evening. An unparalleled sunset experience on the sea with exceptional scenography and gastronomy.
I honestly believe that the Big Art Festival in Porto Cervo will become one of the most talked-about private musical events of the European summer. And it is precisely projects like this that remind me why I still love doing what I do after so many years, which is to create a memory in the hearts and minds of the guests.
Congratulations. All This to Offer Quality to an Audience That You Care a Great Deal About. Is It Really That Important to You?
Certainly! I have my own conviction. That the key to my profession is precisely to be surrounded by people who make me feel more inspired, more reflective, more emotionally alive. People next to whom one becomes deeper, more curious, more refined inwardly. This, to me, is true exclusivity.
I believe that the atmosphere of an evening is not created by the decor, nor by the artists. It is created by the people present. You can organize an incredibly expensive event with world-famous names, extraordinary scenography, impeccable service, exceptional gastronomy, and yet never achieve that elusive feeling of magic for which everything was created. On the other hand, you can gather a hundred “right” people, and suddenly the entire space begins to breathe with a completely different energy. It is an incredibly subtle thing, but it cannot be imitated.
A long time ago, I realized that the luxury of the new era no longer resides in the crowd, but in the close circle. That’s why the Big Art Festival was never conceived as a mass event. From the beginning, it was designed as a carefully curated cultural environment.
We have guests who travel with the festival around the world, from Monaco to Dubai, from Courchevel to Hong Kong, from New York to Porto Cervo. And over time, an extraordinary international community has formed around the project, united by a surprisingly similar vision of life.
The Big Art Festival is celebrating its fifth anniversary. And so, to celebrate it in the best possible way, you decided to create the Big Art Society, an exclusive club to promote the natural continuation of our loyal guests. A bond that keeps us together. Can you explain exactly?
The Big Art Society was born from this very idea: to build an international intellectual and aesthetic community for a new era. Not a simple private club in the traditional sense of the term, but a cultural circle of people who share a similar conception of beauty, quality, and depth. But perhaps the most important thing is not even the status of its members. It’s the atmosphere. The absence of ostentation. A genuine interest in extraordinary experiences and encounters. An appreciation for the exceptional events and conversations we create for them. And a rare sense of inner depth in people.
Maxim, one has the impression that you are not working in the event business in the conventional sense but rather creating entire cultural worlds with their own aesthetics, atmosphere, and philosophy.
This is probably the description closest to how I personally perceive my work. It has always been something much deeper. From the beginning, I was not interested in the outward appearance of an event, but the inner emotional state of the person within that space. I have always believed that true luxury is not about decorations or budgets. True luxury is an emotion that cannot be explained rationally. It’s when, at the end of the evening, a person doesn’t just carry photos on their phone but also an inner emotional state. Months later, they still remember the feeling of happiness, the beauty, and every emotion experienced at that moment.
A true event begins the moment a person stops being just a guest and becomes part of a carefully orchestrated emotional experience.
What You Often Talk About Is What You Call the “Aftertaste” of an Evening. Why Is It So Important to You?
Today the world moves at an extraordinary speed. Information loses value almost instantly. Every day people consume thousands of images, events, brands, faces. Everything dissolves into an endless stream of visual noise. But emotions work differently. An authentic emotion remains imprinted in memory for years. Sometimes for a lifetime. That’s why!
Because emotion is the only thing that really remains imprinted in a person’s mind. Not the number of candles on the tables. Not the height of the floral arrangements. Not the cost of the decorations. Not the names on the guest list. Not even the artist’s name on the poster.
I believe people rarely remember the facts. They remember the emotional state they felt next to you. You might forget the music itself but still remember the chills felt during a particular song.
You might not remember the dinner menu but still remember the feeling of complete inner harmony. This is what I call the aftertaste.
And true luxury today is the ability to create a very rare emotional state: a state where a person feels internally happier, lighter, more alive. And when, long after, they don’t remember the event itself, but the feeling of happiness felt that evening, then everything has been done the right way.
And yet, despite this deeply emotional philosophy, you have built a remarkably serious international structure.
Yes, and I suppose from the outside it all looks like a beautiful cultural story: festivals, world-renowned artists, private dinners, gala evenings, international collaborations. But behind that aesthetic there is an enormous and extremely sophisticated business system.
Today, Berin Iglesias Art is a fully developed international ecosystem: concerts, world tours, festivals, luxury entertainment, artist management, private events, cultural collaborations, strategic partnerships with global brands, hotels, institutions, and art platforms.
Impressive and ever-growing numbers, but what’s the reale secret behind alla this?
The numbers can always grow. The number of events can grow. Even the level of artists can grow, to a certain extent. But the secret is preserving the feeling of uniqueness, preserving the atmosphere, preserving the emotional depth of an evening while the scale of the projects becomes larger and larger. Is where real artistry begins.
I was always deeply afraid of becoming what I call a ‘factory of beautiful events.’ For me, that would feel like a professional failure. Because people always feel the difference between something that was truly created with soul and something that was simply well organised.
That is why we pay such close attention to details, dramaturgy, the quality of the audience, and the emotional energy of a space. We never built our business around famous names or external scale alone.
What always mattered most to me was something else entirely: that even years later, a person would remember not simply a concert or a dinner, but the emotional state they experienced that evening. And perhaps that is the most difficult part of what we do.
After All, Remember, You Are a Professionally Trained Musician, and This Perhaps Makes You Much More Affine and Sensitive to the Emotions and Context in Which You Operate…
Yes, exactly. And I think music will forever remain my first language for understanding the world. It was an incredibly beautiful period of my life: vivid, emotional, filled with movement and a sense of freedom. One evening you are walking onto a stage in one city, the next morning you wake up somewhere completely different. You live inside the rhythm of applause, stage lights, airports, rehearsals, late-night conversations after concerts.
And at some point, you begin to realise that music is far more than simply performing a composition. Gradually, I became more and more fascinated by the phenomenon of how art affects people emotionally.
I think that was the moment I first understood that real art does not happen only on stage. I no longer wanted simply to perform music. I wanted to create entire emotional worlds around it.
I suppose that is where my path as a producer truly began.
