Arts of Pacific Asia opened New York’s fabled Asia Week extravaganza on March 13, with a gala show preview at its new venue, 7 West 34th Street.
The Caskey-Lees production has, for 18 presentations now, been one of the first stops for mainstream Asian art collectors, dealers and curators on the hunt for vetted antique and contemporary treasures. This year’s field of 68 international dealers, down slightly from last year, included several who crossed over from the abandoned uptown show.
With Hong Kong buyers expected over the weekend, Chinese buyers due early in the week and curators from the major museums likely to drop in at any time, the dealers turned out fine wares from all genres. There were traditional Chinese ceramics and Japanese dolls, Raj silver, traditional and contemporary robes, textiles, even a smattering of Asian Art Brut.
S. Marchant & Son of London set the tone for lovers of tradition with a display of rare imperial porcelains. The dealer also showcased intricately carved jades, Sino Tibetan deities and a few works on paper. By show’s end, the reported sales included a Seventeenth Century gilt-splashed tripod centerpiece, the Kangxi (1662‱722) famille verte yanyan vase with birds adorning its panels that had been featured in the show catalog and a Kangxi famille verte dish.
Nearby, at David Baker Oriental Art, London, the showpiece was a Qianlong period (1736‱795) celadon jade vase with russet intrusions from the collection of a retired Hong Kong bank director. Other items included Chinese pottery and porcelains, Korean porcelain and tribal art.
Knapton & Rasti Asian Art, London, offered the item that had been featured on the show catalog’s cover, a stunning 8-inch-tall imperial jade mountain. The creamy white carving featured a jardinière of flowers on a bench set within a landscape of trees that replicated the layers of the forest. The mountain carried the provenance of a private American Midwest collector.
The current vogue for jade carvings could be seen in many booths. First-time exhibitor Mark Walberg Fine Arts and Antiques of Sunbury, Penn., sold several, as did Dragon House, San Francisco, and Vallin Gallery, Wilton, Conn.
At the Jade Dragon, Ann Arbor, Mich., Stuart and Barbara Hilbert, who are in their second decade of exhibiting at Arts of Pacific Asia, had an engaging display of small treasures. Included were Chinese hardstone and bamboo carvings, Ming jades and Chinese Export silver. Japanese offerings included Nineteenth and Twentieth Century art, netsuke and inro, Satsuma and studio ceramics.
Playing the yang to Jade Dragon’s yin, Cédric Curien Art Asiatique, Marseille, France, went large, placing a Chinese coromandel lacquer coffer in the center of its booth. Behind it, a large Japanese Buddha, circa Sixteenth Century, presided from atop a pedestal, which its robes overlapped.
Dressed in exquisite kimonos and costumes of their own, Alan Pate’s Japanese Antique Dolls, St Ignatius, Md., or ningyo, offered an insightful look at what life was like in the Edo period, the Meiji and Taisho eras.
Oriental Treasure Box, San Diego, Calif., also featured Japanese items. Among its sales were a bronze vase and a bamboo item.
Ceramics created by Awaji artisans, who exported pottery from the latter part of the Nineteenth Century until 1939, when the kilns closed, made a stunning display at Cannondale Antiques, Wilton, Conn. Known as Awaji ware, the mostly hand-thrown and exuberantly colored offerings had a pointed influence on the Western Arts and Crafts movement.
Moving along on the tour of offerings from Pacific Rim countries, The Kang Collection of Korean Art, New York City, showed and sold a late Nineteenth Century, Joseon period, ten-panel folding screen by Cheo Seok-Hwan, Ho: Nang-Gok. The gallery also sold a Joseon period hanging scroll by Gim Gyu-Jin.
Soo Tze, Hobart, Tasmania, showed treasures from Tibet. She sold several bronzes, repoussé items and paintings.
Wynward T. Wilkinson, London, filled cases upon cases with fine English and Colonial silver. Among the standouts were a Colonial India punch ladle in the shape of a jockey’s cap and whip, a Mughal period parcel gilt tureen, circa 1770, made for Europeans, and an impressive two-handled silver vase, circa 1900, by K. Krishna Chetty, that depicted gods astride animals.
Livening up the show, Jon Eric Riis, Atlanta, brought out the beads and skulls. Both a coat maker and a dealer, Riis used his oeuvre, exemplified by a coat with a modern skull motif executed in beadwork, to draw buyers to the more traditional Chinese robes. He sold several of the latter.
With contemporary offerings in the mix, it was no surprise when Cavin-Morris Gallery, New York City, showed examples of Japanese Art Brut. The crayon on cardboard drawings were the work of Yoshimitsu Tomizuka, an intellectually disabled artist who focuses on couples and weddings. Of an entirely different bent were kiln-fired books by porcelain artist Yohein Nishimura. Carefully fired without any ceramic ingredients as aids, the books retained a hint of form and evoked a strange, dark beauty.
One could not leave the show without taking note of Joss Graham Ethnographic Textiles and Works of Art, London. Among the outstanding items was a recently acquired wall-sized ritual shawl decorated with images of the sacred mountain of jewels. Begun when a female child was born, it is typical of ritual vestments that are worked on for many years and generally not finished until the wedding is arranged. Graham sold a number of the textiles.
Judith Rutherford, Castle Cove, Australia, showed, among other textiles, a Ming velvet panel with three-eyed dragons. She sold an important Chinese robe to an undisclosed buyer.
At show’s end, Caskey-Lees sent out a survey to the dealers with several dealers saying sales were weaker than they had been in other years. There were, however, several sales in the six-figure category.
The dates of the 2010 Arts of Pacific Asia Show have not yet been announced. As in the past, they will mirror the timetable set by the major auction houses. For more information, www.caskeylees.com or 310-455-2886.
