ASIAN ART The newspaper for collectors, dealers, museums and galleries • june 2005 • £5.00/US$8/€10

The newspaper for collectors, dealers, museums and galleries • june 2012 • £5.00/US$10/€10

Asia Society Texas Opens in Houston

The first part of this year has seen a remarkable expansion of the Asia Society, first with the opening of its first overseas centre in Hong Kong in February (Asian Art Newspaper, March 2012), and now the Texas centre in April. Houston was the ideal location for a new centre because of that great town’s long association with the Asia Society, for in 1979 former First Lady Barbara Bush and the late former Ambassador Roy M. Huffington founded Asia Society Texas. It was Roy Huffington who raised the stakes on behalf of the Asia Society several years ago when New York was in one of its self-induced financial crises and decided that taxing non-profit organisations would be just the ticket for raising revenue. Roy, however, would have none of it and informed the New York power structure that should the tax proposal pass into law he would personally pay to buy land, build a suitable building and transport the entire New York Asia Society, its collection and to relocate its staff to Houston, Texas.

n 1995, Asia Society Texas decided that it needed a home of its own in order to thrive and expand the work of Asia Society. Funds were raised and Asia Society Texas Center opened its doors on April 12th with wonderful Texas fanfare in a stunning building that was brilliantly designed by Yoshio Taniguchi and located in Houston’s Museum District. Heated and cooled by an extraordinary system of 117 wells installed 250 feet beneath the Center’s parking lot, the centre has been constructed with enormous glass windows and elements such as Jura limestone, American cherry wood, Italian Basaltina stone and American Appalachian white oak. As part of its opening, the ASTC will be exhibiting a number of Asian masterpieces from the New York-based Rockefeller Collection as well as Contemporary Asian Art: Texas Connections in the centre’s Fayez Sarofim Grand Hall, an exhibition of works by Asian and Asian-American artists who have lived in Texas or whose works are in public and private collections in Texas. The current exhibitions will continue through September and after that exhibitions will change three times a year. Along with its historical purpose of promoting and exhibiting both traditional and contemporary arts, the centre will also have available its own performing arts theatre as well as an education programmes that include courses and educational facilities for age groups beginning with kindergarten. The Asia Society’s highly respected business education programmes will continue in Houston with courses and visiting experts on Asian business and trade, politics, diplomacy and other public policy issues. The executive director of the centre is Martha Blackwelder, who successfully steered the San Antonio Museum of Art into the great world of Asian art and with whom the Asia Society Texas Center is in safe and highly capable hands.

adly, Roy Huffington is not with us to see this wonderful event, but after many long talks I had had with him over the years, I can see that his hopes and dreams for Asia Society’s opening of such a great centre in Houston have all come to pass. Martin Barnes Lorber verlooking the water terrace at Asia Society in Houston, Texas

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16.04.12 12:31

news in brief

PHOTOGRAPHY FESTIVAL, ARLES This year there are over 60 exhibitions and 50 workshops in the 43rd edition of the Arles photography festival. Since 2001, the festival revived the tradition of workshops, developed free lecture series and workshops over the opening week (2-8 July), as well as book signings and guided tours of the exhibitions. Asian photographers have been nominated for the 2012 Discovery Award, including Chu Ha Chung (Korea) and Osamu James Nakagawa (US/Japan). Also on show is a photography exhibition about Aung San Suu Kyi’s successful campaign for parliament in Myanmar in May 2012 – with the images all taken by local photojournalists. This exhibition was first shown in Yangon in May. The Prix Pictet shortlist will be announced in Arles on 4 July. Les Rencontres d’Arles runs from 2 July to 23 September, www.rencontres-arles.com. newasian curator, CLEveland The Cleveland Museum of Art has announced the appointment of Sonya Rhie Quintanilla as the George P. Bickford Curator of Indian and Southeast Asian Art. The museum plans to complete its building expansion and Asian collection reinstallation in 2013 and Quintanilla will have the opportunity to oversee the installation of the museum’s Indian and Southeast Asian art collections. Quintanilla is currently the Curator of Asian Art for The San Diego Museum of Art and has held that position since 2004. Quintanilla will begin her appointment at the Cleveland Museum of Art in September 2012. Genghis Khan Sculpture, London A bronze sculpture of the Mongolian warrior Genghis Khan was unveiled in central London in April to mark the 850th anniversary of his birth. The Siberian artist, Dashi Namdakov, was inspired by the historic Buryat Buddhist cultures, which are part of his own ancestral heritage. With Genghis Khan, the artist has created an equestrian statue of an epic character which embodies the very essence of nomadism and brings the culture of the ancient Mongols to the London

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Profile: the artist Zarina Hashmi The recent Buddhist Art Forum at the Courtauld in London Chinese ink painting in London and New York Southern Song dynasty paintings in Tokyo More ruined ruins ... in southern Laos The Zelnik Collection, Southeast Asian gold in Budapest Two war museums in Vietnam Seductions of the palace: the history of cooking and cuisine in China, in Paris Fairs Zeshin in Paris; Turkish-Dutch early traders in Amsterdam; Chinese archaeology in New York; tomb treasures in Cambridge; Japanese prints in Zurich Listings Islamic Arts Diary

Next issue September 2012 Events in New York and Paris and what’s on in the autumn

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