Asian Artists Living in in the 20th Century / / 11:15am - 12:45pm Friday, 27th November, 2020

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12 Asian Artists Living in Paris in the 20th Century

Title

Asian Artists Living in Paris in the 20th Century

Session Chair

Dr Véronique Chagnon-Burke Christie's Education, New York, USA

First Session Chair short biography

Véronique Chagnon-Burke is an Associate Professor and Academic Director at Christie’s Education New York. She teaches art market studies. A specialist in the history of nineteenth century French landscape painting, her fields of expertise also include nineteenth century art criticism and the art market as well as the role of women in the art world. She received her Ph.D. from The Graduate Center of the City University of New York, her M.A. from the Institute of Fine Arts of New York University, and her Licence from the Université Paris- Sorbonne. She is also a graduate of the Ecole du Louvre in museum studies. She has taught a wide range of subjects at Queens College, Parsons School of Design, and Hunter College, among other institutions. Her museum and research positions have included work at the Museum of and the College Art Association, and she has also worked at the Hôtel Drouot in Paris. Recent publications include: The Politicization of Nature: The Critical Reception of Barbizon Painting During the July Monarchy (2009), ‘Rue Laffitte: Looking at and Buying Contemporary Art in Mid-Nineteenth Century Paris in Nineteenth-Century Art Worldwide (2012) and, Women Art Critics in the Nineteenth Century: Vanishing Acts, a collaborative anthology with Heather Jensen and Wendelin Guentner (2013). Most recently she has been focusing on organizing academic conferences which bring together art history and art market studies, such as Celebrating Female Agency in the Art in June 2018, and Women Art Dealers 1940-1990 in May 2019. She is founding member of the New York chapter of The International Art Market Studies Association [TIAMSA]. Her current collaborative project is the Women Art Dealers Digital Archive (WADDA), a digital platform that maps the role women art dealers played in the institutionalization of modern and contemporary art.

Session Abstract

This session focuses on Asian artists who made Paris their home during the 1920s and 1930s. As it has been well-documented, from the end of the nineteenth century to the late 1900s, Paris remained a magnet for artists coming from all over the world. From practical training, to a rich historical and cultural patrimony, and a culture with a reputation of permissiveness, Paris offered also plenty of opportunities to show your work and a dynamic network of dealers in an artist-friendly art ecosystem. The three papers selected will stress the central role played by Paris in facilitating the appropriation of western modern art styles and techniques by Asian artists. These artists from Indonesia, Japan and took what they learned in Paris to develop their own take on modern art; all using it to different ends. Foujita created a hybrid style that positioned him as an exotic artist in a very crowded Parisian art world. Salim Saraochmin and Raden Mas Jodjana, despite their nationalist affiliations worked in an international style based on formal solutions rather than images of revolution. Liu Kang took what he learned in Paris first back to the Art Academy then to to become one of the main artists responsible for the formation of the Style. Finally, by looking at the market for Foujita and Liu Kang, this session hopes to demonstrate that the artworks of these historical figures continues to be popular among the Asian audience. 36 Awakening of Local Interest: Trans-Continental Travel of Foujita’s Artworks (R)

Shuochun (Nina) Feng Poly Auction, , Hong Kong

Paper abstract

Foujita has been perceived as a trending Japanese modern artist on the auction market in recent years, with several oil and etching works auctioned off with significant higher prices than before (La fête d'anniversaire for $9,313,830 in 2018; NU AU CHAT for $5,082,600 in 2016). Big retrospective exhibitions last year travelling internationally has also boosted his global exposure to a greater audience’s group. My research enables the creation of new provenance model via digital images of auction records on Foujita Tsuguharu as online auction records databases have made vast improvements on managing sales records via digitization: not only recording with greater precision, but almost every time provide the sales entry full- color photographs of most of the artworks sold. I have generated a new dataset which encompasses the international auction records of Foujita Tsuguharu in a period from 1982 to 2018, with each entry linked with a digital image of the artwork. The findings indicate intriguing travel paths of Foujita’s artworks from Europe to majorly Asian countries. The “awakening” local interest on Foujita of Asia in a global market where Foujita is increasingly exhibited and researched seems to be counter-intuitive yet reasonable if we look deeper into the public opinions towards Foujita in Japan. The dominant local ties can also be further studied with the model of Globalization of Markets for Contemporary Art by Olav Velthuis where he discussed that globalization actually reinforces stronger home bias for domestic artists.

37 The Cross Culture Integration by Nanyang Style Chinese Masters (R)

Allison Liu Daisong Song Art Foundation, Singapore, Singapore

Paper abstract

Chinese artists started to land in to study western art since 100 years ago. Among them , Xu Beihong, Zao Wou-Ki and Wu Guanzhong are the most famous art masters. This paper will examine Liu Kang's art as an example of one of such French school artists who first studied in Shanghai Art Academy (SAA) in the 1920s and studied in Paris from 1920s to 1930s, and went back to teach in SAA again till the outbreak of Sino-Japan war, until last settled in Singapore to be one of the pioneer artists who played an important role in the formation of Nanyang Style, how he inherited the Chinese traditional arts, integrated the French modern arts which was very much influenced by Japan Ukiyo-e that actually was influenced by traditional Chinese arts, then integrated the Nanyang characters during his living in Malaysia and Singapore after 1937, in order to discover the hidden clue of how Nanyang style was formed with such a complicated integration eventually. The academic circle in used to woo Soviet Union art since 1949, and they seem to be turning towards French School art masters in recent years, with such cases to prove as the exhibition "Pioneering: Artistes Chinois En France Pionniers De L'Art Moderne En Chine" in the Central Art Academy Beijing in Jan 2019, the Retrospective exhibition of Wu Guanzhong in Tsing Hua University Museum Beijing in Nov 2019 and the Centennial Exhibition of Chu Teh-Chun in the National Museum of China in Beijing in Apr 2020. So such an integration and cultural exchange in will be one of the very important future trend in art world, not only in the academic meaning but also in the market presence. 38 Modern Indonesian artist in Paris (R)

Dr Matt Cox Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia

Paper abstract

This paper maps out some relationships between Indonesian artists and activist living in Paris in the early 20th century that support an alternative understanding of the history of Indonesian modern art as it developed in Europe.

I will compare the way that the lives and ideas of 20th century Indonesian artists Salim Saraochmin and Raden Mas Jodjana, and political activists Soewardi Soerjaningrat (Ki Hadjar Dewantara) and Sutan Sjahrir ‘were profoundly shaped by mobility, travel, and the experience of exile.’[1] The lives of these four men give witness to the potential for any diasporic community to contribute both to the country where they currently reside and their home country providing an historical example of the diasporic community’s efficacy in reaffirming national identities. Raden Mas Jodjana hailed from a central Javanese court like national hero and pedagogue Soewardi Soerjaningrat and arrived in Holland in 1914. The two became friends and put on performances together. In time Jodjana became internationally famous as a dancer, but alongside his dance practice Jodjana was an active participant in the art circles of The Hague and Paris. Jodjana moved to Paris at the invitation of the Swiss-born art deco interior decorator and artists Jean Dunand where he was engaged with the L'Association Française des Amis de l'Orient and was also employed for a while at Dunand’s atelier. The Sumatran born painter Salim Sariochmin moved to Europe in 1923 at the age of 15. In 1928 he finished school in Netherlands and moved to Paris to study at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière and from 1929 -1932 he studied at the atelier of Academie Fernand Leger. In 1929 he met with fellow Sumatran Sutan Sjahrir (who was studying in the Netherlands and in 1945 became first prime minister of Indonesia) and the two frequented cafes, theatres, concerts and political meeting. Encouraged by Sjahrir, Salim returned to Indonesia in 1932. In 1936 Salim retuned to Paris and study at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière and was probably the most widely internationally exhibited modern Indonesian artist before 1950. Distinct from Indonesian artists working within Indonesia who found specifically Indonesian imagery as the source for nationalist expression, Jodjana and Salim sought formal solutions to the national problem rather than indexical motifs of ethnicity or imagery of the revolution.

[1] Kusno, A. (2010). The Appearance of Memory. Mnemonic Practise of Architecture and Urban Form in Indonesia. United States of America, Duke University Press, p18