With a remarkable number of exhibitions, auctions and events, March has become the month of Asian art
North light floods the Kaikodo gallery, illuminating a 17th-century Chinese scroll with its scene of a robed scholar contemplating a waterfall tumbling down jagged rocks. Perched high in an airy duplex above East 79th Street, the gallery specializes in Asian art, and the light is a perfect complement for the silvery green of a 10th-century celadon pitcher, or the group of small, dignified Buddhist, gilt-bronze votive figures.
Carol Conover, the gallery’s director, hopes this year’s Asia Week New York—taking place March 20 through 28—will awaken art lovers everywhere to the treasures in the field. “Of course, I’m a longtime convert,” she admits, casting a glance at a green-and-gold ceramic headrest decorated with a playful lion. “There’s been a big increase in interest in Asian art in recent years. Now everyone can see why.”
While many Asian galleries sell at least half of their objects to museums and universities—with the price of items soaring into the millions—they also find buyers for the other half among seasoned collectors and ordinary citizens who appreciate the art’s allure.
Utagawa Kuniyoshi, “Sakata Kaidomaru Wrestles with a Giant Carp,” c. 1837, on view at Japan Society March 12 through June 13.
“It’s always enjoyed a niche audience,” says Amy Poster, curator emeritus of the Brooklyn Museum Asian Art Department. “But people have become more attuned to Eastern philosophies and artistic milieus. They are better read and travel more widely. People who collected modern Western masters look to Asia. After all, Asia isn’t very far away anymore. It’s a well-priced field, with works that may be underappreciated, and thus, very affordable.”
Though Asian art fairs are not new to the city, at no other time has the Asian Art Dealers New York, a dealer-run organization composed of 30 international specialists, made such a concerted effort to arrange appealing events for the public. In fact, Asia Week is not a traditional fair and since it coincides with a number of other related exhibitions, auctions and events, March is the unofficial month of Asian art.
Unlike the Haughton International Asian Art Fair—which took place from 1996 until last year, and had booths in one central location—Asia Week begins with a special weekend of open houses March 20 and 21, when New York gallery owners and private dealers, along with others in the United States, France, England, Italy and Japan, will offer visitors a wide variety of outstanding works of art. Along with the full scope of ancient through contemporary arts represented—from China, India, Nepal, Tibet, Southeast Asia, Japan and Korea—collectors are also invited to attend lectures and receptions. Special activities are planned at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, China Institute, Korea Society and Rubin Museum of Art. It also coincides with two impressive exhibits: Arts of Ancient Viet Nam at Asia Society and the Japan Society’s Graphic Heroes, Magic Monsters: Japanese Prints by Utagawa Kuniyoshi from the Arthur R. Miller Collection.
The week also coincides with sales of Asian art at Christie’s, Sotheby’s and Doyle New York. If that’s not enough to satisfy you, the New York Arts of Pacific Asia Show, an important fair for Chinese and Japanese antique ceramics and textiles, takes place March 24 through 28, and I.M. Chait will present the Important Chinese Ceramics & Works of Art Auction March 17 as well.
It’s an understatement, but no Asian art market is hotter than the Chinese. In the New York auctions last September, Christie’s dominated with $36.5 million in Asian art sales, outdoing Sotheby’s total of $19.2 million, with the largest percentage of sales being Chinese objects and paintings. Though long collected by Europeans, Americans and Japanese, who started in the 8th century, their art now draws far more Chinese, the big favorites including Imperial period jade, paintings and porcelain. “They have a lot of buying power,” Conover says. “It used to be just Hong Kong and Taiwan, now Chinese from the mainland are buying. Consequently, prices have gone through the roof. They want to buy back their culture.”
Chinese national institutions have also gotten into the swing of things. “With the vast fortunes recently made there, [the Chinese] are creating private museums, which are funded by companies,” explains Conor Mahony, president of the Chinese Porcelain Company. “The trend started in Hong Kong and now it’s spread to Beijing.” Mahony’s gallery will present Natural Forms in Chinese Ink Painting, eight new works from three of the most celebrated contemporary Chinese artists, Liu Dan, Zeng Xiaojun and Chun-yi Lee, giving some idea of the current vibrancy in the field.
With Japan in a recession, the Japanese have not been very active in the market but European and American collectors remain just as enchanted with their works. Hiroshi Yanagi Oriental Art from Kyoto, which will be shown at Berry-Hill Galleries, is bringing 30 significant pieces—from the 12th to the early 20th centuries—including Buddhist sculptures, ceramics, lacquer objects, folding screens and hanging scrolls by leading masters. To get some idea of the quality on view, one has only to see the dramatic, almost 6-foot-tall, 14th-century wooden sculpture of Myoken Bosatsu, the deity of the Polar Star and of the Big Dipper, who was invoked for relief in disasters or to prevent calamities.
Japanese art dealer Joan Mirviss enjoys introducing artists to American audiences, so for Asia Week she decided on Nagae Shigekazu, one of the world’s leading sculptors in porcelain and well known to the cognoscenti. He adapts the traditional method for mass-producing porcelain wares in order to create sensuous white sculptures. The two works in Forms in Succession look like liquid sheets of origami. “Even though the market goes up and down, I still have many of the same collectors I started with in the 1970s,” Mirviss explains. “They may have begun with one small piece but now some of them are on museum boards, and art has become a major force in their lives. On the other side, I don’t think there’s anything more exciting than being able to call an artist and say, ‘I just sold one of your works to the Metropolitan Museum,’ or even, ‘They’re going to feature something of yours on a postcard?”
To give some idea of the breadth of Asia Week’s offerings, one only need wander from Mirviss’ space to Carlton Rochell’s gallery, which features works from India, the Himalayas and Tibet. Worlds and centuries separate Shigekazu’s pristine and fluid sculpture and the robust, rotund and sexually eager 10th-century Ganesha sandstone figure in his space. Delightful pieces like this partly account for the upsurge in interest in Indian art, but Rochell suggests another. “The main reason it’s so popular right now is very simply that generally it’s more affordable” Rochell says. “Indians have not collected classical Indian art. You can buy an Indian masterpiece for far less than one from either China or Japan. But you need to do some homework. India has a very long history and three religions. You should immerse yourself to understand the complexity.”
His dictum applies to the art of every Asian region. Keum Ja Kang, president and founder of the Kang Collection of Korean Art, has been educating novices in the art of her country for decades. Sitting in her tranquil gallery, an earthenware pot of Korean tea steaming in front of her, she explains how few connoisseurs there were in the United States when she arrived 40 years ago to study at Columbia University. History played a big part in the dearth of Korean art scholarship, since the Japanese occupied Korea from 1910-1945, and not long afterwards, it lost three million people in the Korean War. Kang would not be stopped, however, and as a young wife and mother in New York, she frequently went on buying trips to Seoul, eventually establishing the first important Korean gallery in the United States in 1981.
“Everything has changed now,” she says. “We have more and more Korean curators at the museums. People who really know and love our art. It’s scarce because of our history, but there’s more than enough to fill major collections.” As worthy of any museum, she calls attention to the eight-panel, 19th-century folding screen populated with the sun, clouds, rocks, water, the long-lived pine and tortoise, the evergreen bamboo, the bright vermillion immortal fungus, and the crane and deer—messengers of the Daoist immortals who may live over 1,000 years. Titled “Ten Symbols of Longevity,” it is part of the exhibition Harmony and Nature: Auspicious Symbols in Korean Art.
Today, Korea boosts its art. Just last week, the country inaugurated the first Korean Art Fair in New York. Demand isn’t new, however: Because of the scarcity of works, prices in the late 1990s went through the roof, recalls dealer Jiyoung Koo, former Head of the Korean Art Department at Sotheby’s New York. “They would just add a zero to any estimate on Korean art,” she explains. “But things have quieted down. Today, anything over 50 years old can’t be taken out of the country and that, of course, only adds to the scarcity. Still, enough is around and a lot has been misidentified as Chinese or Japanese.” At Koo New York, she will exhibit Commemoration & Compassion: Korean Court and Buddhist Treasures.
Max Rutherston, director of London-based Sydney L. Moss, offers the same advice to potential buyers of Asian art: “Start by looking around as much as possible until you’re familiar with the art and have determined what interests you most. Visit museums, galleries and auctions. Whenever possible, handle the art, particularly three-dimensional objects, don’t just look at them in cabinets. Talk to anyone interested in the field. Read. Only then should you dip your toe in the water. Even then, always seek good advice and don’t act on your own counsel alone.”
Hearing dealers and collectors talk about Asian art is like eavesdropping on a love fest. James Lally, owner of JJ Lally & Co.—which is presenting Chinese Ceramics in Black and White, a supremely elegant group of ritual vessels created by Chinese potters from the Neolithic period through the 18th century—serves as a good example. “What I love most about Asian art,” he says, “is the constant learning process. There are thousands of years to discover, and so much fascinating information. When I visit another dealer or collector, we have so much to share. The dialogue never stops.”
But Katherine Martin, director of Scholten Japanese Art, may have the best advice for new or seasoned collectors when she offers: “No matter what, only buy what you love. Never buy anything just because you think it’s a deal.”
