Reports artasiapacific.com^41Whispering Gallery
sectors of Hong Kong society that
continue to infuriate the Beijing
government as they try to swim in
their own direction?
These strange incidents,
however, are not deterring
commercial galleries from swan-
diving into the deepening pools
of China’s art market. In Hong
Kong, Austrian gallerist Thaddaeus
Ropac—known for his blue-chip
dealerships in Salzburg, Paris
and London—lured the dashing
Nick Buckley Wood away from
regional queen parrotfish Pearl
Lam. Although Ropac has been
on the lookout for an Asia rep formany years now, it remains to be
seen if he will soon open a physical
space in Central in the same waters
as brawny barracudas Gagosian
and David Zwirner. Speaking of
the latter New York heavyweight,
word on the street is that Zwirner
is still fielding applications for a
director to lead its Hong Kong
branch—with just half a year until
the gallery unveils its splashy two-
floor location.
For those looking for calmer
shoals, and more affordable rents, it
might be worth knowing that Pace
Seoul purportedly transacted USD 10
million of art in the very first month
of operations in South Korea. And
Tokyo’s Taka Ishii, always one to
buck trends, is supposedly looking to
open his first branch in Asia outside
of Japan. Wonder if he’ll cruise
toward the Korean capital or steer
somewhere even more unexpectedAs the big and little fish of the
Asian art community converged for
Art Basel Hong Kong’s fifth edition,
the most persistent question
humming throughout the aisles was:
what caused the sudden calling off
of the Guggenheim’s UBS MAP
exhibition, “But a Storm Is Blowing
from Paradise: Contemporary Art of
the Middle East and North Africa,”
at Shanghai’s Rockbund Museum?
The news came less than a month
away from the show’s anticipated
preview date—and after a giant
wave of publicity in early February.
While Chinese authorities’ aversion
to even passing references to social
turmoil is well known, an equally
plausible theory swirling around
the Hong Kong fish bowl was that
it was China’s way of playing tough
with the Trump administration, via
New York’s Guggenheim museum.
Will international art suffer the
same chilly fate as K-Pop on the
mainland? Are the big kahunas in
Beijing and Washington picking off
some easy catches as they circle
one another?
Coincidentally—or not—around
the same time, works by Hong Kong’s
outsider artist Tsang Tsou-choi, the
self-declared “King of Kowloon,”
experienced a similar reversal of
fortune. The late King’s works
were due to be presented before a
Cantonese audience in Guangzhou,
China’s third most populous city
and just 90 miles north of the Hong
Kong-Shenzhen border, but failed to
obtain an import license. Could this
also be another spanking of errant
Live Bait
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like the shores of Taiwan, where
there is an insatiable appetite for
Japanese postwar photography.
Members of Renzo Piano’s
Building Workshop have also been
seen quietly sploshing around
Taiwan’s capital city, where there
are murmurs that a new private
museum is in the works. If indeed
the legendary Italian architect is
involved in a Taipei venture, it will
probably be the most elegant—and
functional—museum space in all
of Asia, considering his previous
track record with Basel’s Foundation
Beyeler, the Menil Collection in
Houston and New York’s new
Whitney Museum, which offers
great views of American art and
the Hudson River.
Swapping the coast for the
mountains, the Bunnag-Beurdeley
family’s MAIIAM Contemporary
Art Museum in Chiang Mai garnered
rave reviews, and other collectors
in Thailand are now contemplating
following suit by heading upriver.
Land in the holiday city is cheaper
and more atmospheric than buzzy,
traffic-congested Bangkok. The
larger question is not whether there
is enough art to fill these private
institutions—Thailand has legions
of art schools—or local architects to
design the museum (Thai labor laws
strictly prohibit foreign architects).
Rather, are there enough curators to
steer these creative barges? If any
independent curators are reading
this, they might want to brush up
on their Thai.
Less concerned about rising
coastal sea-levels is Jakarta’s
Haryanto Adikoesoemo, one of
the massive whales of Asia whose
attention is sought by every art
dealer as far as New York and as
nearby as Singapore. Known for his
taste for international, expensive,
big-name art, Haryanto hosted a
soft opening of his private Museum
MACAN in mid-March. The
Southeast Asian art scene turned
out in full force; there were artists,
auction specialists and fellow
collectors—that is, only “close
friends.” One person who didn’t join
the raft of 200 diners was former
director Thomas J. Berghuis, whose
ship had sailed before the museum’s
launch, although Haryanto
graciously thanked him during his
welcome speech.
One novel development for
seafaring collectors is a new
residency hosted aboard the HMS
Delfina Foundation in London.
Apparently the ten-year-old
nonprofit organization is trying to
lure adventurous art patrons from
Asia into its bunks, offering the
same stipends and other perks
granted to travelers that the Delfina
Foundation usually hosts—meaning,
nothing luxurious. The million-
pound question is whether Asian
collectors will go along for
the ride, without even a first-class
berth to get them there. But just
think of the intimate deals that
might take place in those cabins
at night...
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