By the age of 23 he had bought works by Twombly, Beuys, Fontana, Yves Klein, de Kooning, Cornell, and Kounellis.
In 1972, he became the sole proprietor of Galerie Karsten Greve in its original Cologne Lindenstraße location, debuting with an Yves Klein solo exhibition of his Anthropometry series.
Karsten Greve has an interest in vintage design furniture and is an avid collector of items by the likes of Robert Mallet-Stevens, Le Corbusier and Pierre Chareau.
[5] During a career of 40 years as an international art dealer, Karsten Greve significantly contributed to the worldwide recognition of artists such as Louise Bourgeois – as the first to exhibit her in Europe [14] - John Chamberlain, Lucio Fontana, Jannis Kounellis, Piero Manzoni and Cy Twombly, of which up to two thirds of the works in today's market were sold by him initially.
"[16] Karsten Greve earned a reputation for his carefully curated presentations at art fairs and museum quality exhibitions [18][19][20][21][22][23][24] and has been lauded for his ability to recognize the relevance of artist's work long before their rise to international recognition.
[29] Karsten Greve supports the Jewish National Fund (קרן קימת לישראל, Keren Kayemet LeYisrael) in its environmental efforts and afforestation project.