Courtesy, Sothebys
The obsessive focus on Asian collectors within auction houses sometimes conceals the fact that the markets for Japanese and Korean art remains strong. This past week’s Asian Art Week in New York stood as proof, with two works offering fascinating test cases for those markets.
The first, a white glazed Korean moon jar from the Joseon Dynasty (1392–1910), sold for $3.6 million (including fees) in a single-lot Sotheby’s sale titled “Everything is Transient.” (As impressive as that number is, a similar, albeit slightly larger, moon jar from the same period sold just a few months ago, in May at Christie’s, for an earth-shaking $4.5 million, the same price as a beachfront mansion in the New York City.)
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Moon jars like this one have become symbols for the recent increase in desirability historical Asian artworks now hold. The doubtful need only to look toward the buying habits of RM, the frontman of the pop group BTS. In 2019 the main BTS Twitter account posted a picture of RM sitting on the floor, cradling a giant moon jar created by the celebrated Korean ceramicist Kwon Dae Sup.
Kwon, along with artists like artist Ik-Joong Kang, Jane Yang-D’Haene, and Young Sook Park, have embraced and popularized the moon jar, a centuries-old tradition whose production methods are so difficult that contemporary ceramicists can only make around ten per year.
Moon jars were originally made by royal ceramicists to hold grains, liquids, and floral arrangements. According to Angela McAteer, Sotheby’s international head of Chinese art for the Americas and Europe, a moon jar must be at least 40 centimeters (about 16 inches) tall in order to be desirable to connoisseurs. Experts say that there aren’t many left from the Joseon Dynasty—perhaps just a few dozen.
While traditionally Asian art and ceramics are collected in Asia, moon jars, McAteer said, have international appeal because they fit within multiple collecting categories. She says collectors of abstract art, antiquities, and design have all shown interest in the moon jar. To McAtter, it’s “those imperfections, that alchemy that happens in the kiln—that is what humanizes a moon jar and gives it its character, rather than it [having] a pristine, perfect white glaze.”
The moon jar, which the auction house estimated to sell for a sum “in excess of $3 million,” sold during a brisk, three-and-a-half minute single-lot auction to its sole bidder.
Meanwhile, over at Christie’s, a pair of Under the Wave off Kanagawa woodblock prints by the Japanese artist Katsushika Hokusai came up for auction. There were great expectations for these prints, given that in March of last year, another version of this work, also known as The Great Wave, sold at Christie’s for $2.76 million on an estimate of $500,000–$700,000. The more expensive of the two prints this go around sold for $1.7 million, more than double its high estimate of $700,000. The second print, which was of a slightly lesser quality, sold for $252,000, a whisper over its high estimate.
Of course, it’s all but impossible to compare prints without considering the myriad factors that go into the appraisal process, like the condition of the paper, the impression made by the woodblock, and whether the impression left any cracks or gaps. The March Great Wave “was probably the earliest impression of the print we’ve ever offered at auction,” Takaaki Murakami, vice president, specialist, and head of Korean art at Christie’s, told ARTnews.
On the $1.7 million Great Wave from this season, Murakami spotted some defects, gaps in the block lines that came from damage to the original block, but the image was shill sharp. The $252,000 print had a crease down the center and the image was less sharp due to a damaged woodblock.
Great Wave prints used to be very common around the time that Hokusai made them. But, according to Murakami, although no one knows the number of Great Wave prints that still exist, only around 200 remain may remain. Christie’s holds the top seven world records for Great Wave prints sold at auction.
Yet there is more to the Great Wave than the prints’ prices and condition reports. Like the moon jar it has for years been building a global appeal. The image of Hokusai’s wave enveloping a fisherman’s vessel, with Mount Fuji just a speck in the background, has reached the twin pinnacles of popular culture in the form of a $100 Lego set and a pair of Dr. Martens boots.
Since the auction record in March, Murakami said, a handful of clients have approached Christie’s with Great Wave prints. Next March, during Asian Art Week, a true measure of Hokusai’s popularity among collectors might become clear when the house brings a complete set of the artist’s Fugaku sanjurokkei (Thirty-six views of Mount Fuji) prints to auction. Under the Wave off Kanagawa is just one of the prints in the 46-print set, which is expected to fetch millions of dollars (an exact estimate has not yet been determined).
Neither auction house would share information about the identity of the buyers. Asian Art Week ends September 28 at Christies and on September 26 at Sotheby’s.
