Asia Art Weekly News Bulletin – ISSUE 33 Week of 22 September 2025
(1) Phillips Celebrates a Decade in Asia With Landmark Modern & Contemporary Art Auctions
Phillips marks its 10th anniversary in Asia with the Modern & Contemporary Art Fall Auctions this weekend. The sales are led by works from Yoshitomo Nara, Tom Wesselmann, Yayoi Kusama, Takashi Murakami and more.
(2) Women Shaping Korean Art: Asian Art Museum’s Lee So-young charts new vision for Asian diaspora
The Asian Art Museum of San Francisco named Lee So-Young as its new Barbara Bass Director and CEO. She is the second Asian American woman to serve as the head of the museum.
(3) Central Asia Has a New Cultural Hub: Bukhara Biennial 2025
“Recipes for Broken Hearts”, launched in Uzbekistan, invites artists and locals to heal together through meals, music, textiles, and performance.
(4) The global art market churn may be good for Indian art. Art Basel Hong Kong Director’s first India visit is proof
With the majority of Indian art falling below the $10 million (high-end) segment, which is experiencing cooling, India has emerged as an ideal destination for global collectors and art fairs.
(1) Phillips Celebrates a Decade in Asia With Landmark Modern & Contemporary Art Auctions
(Photo Credit: Philips)
The Phillips Modern & Contemporary Art Evening Sale on September 27 in Hong Kong will showcase a curated selection of works, with nearly two-thirds making their auction debut—featuring a blend of in-demand young artists and post-war masters. This event marks a significant moment for the auction house, emphasizing rare and previously unseen pieces that reflect evolving trends in the art market.
Notable highlights include Yoshitomo Nara’s seminal painting “Pinky” (est. 7.69–10.26M), one of only four such compositions in his oeuvre, and Tom Wesselmann’s “Smoker #17” (est. 2.56–3.85M), which set a world record in 2007. The sale also features Andy Warhol’s “Hearts Pink,” David Hockney’s iPad-created lockdown piece, and works by visionary women artists like Yayoi Kusama and Ruth Asawa, whose sculpture marks her Hong Kong auction debut.
Phillips’ Hong Kong Head of Auctions Danielle So and Head of Sale Rebecca Hu highlighted the sale’s resonance, noting its alignment with the firm’s 10th anniversary in Asia and its appeal to collectors. The Evening Sale will occur on September 27 at 7 p.m. HKT, followed by a Day Sale on September 28 at 2 p.m. HKT, featuring modern and pop-art visionaries like Takashi Murakami and his Kaikai Kiki collective, with full catalogs available on Phillips’ website.
News Source: https://hypebeast.com/2025/9/phillips-modern-contemporary-art-hong-kong-fall-auctions-yoshitomo-nara-yayoi-kusama-tom-wesselmann-zao-wao-ki-takashi-murakamai-kaikai-kiki-andy-warhol
(2) Women Shaping Korean Art: Asian Art Museum’s Lee So-young charts new vision for Asian diaspora
(Photo Credit: KoreaHerald/ Ian Chin)
San Francisco has served as a vital bridge between Asia and America since the 19th-century Gold Rush, fostering one of the largest Asian diasporas in the U.S. Today, Asian Americans comprise 38% of the city’s population, with their cultural influence extending beyond immigrant neighborhoods into mainstream food, language, and media. This rich history provides a foundational context for the evolving role of Asian art and identity in American society.
Lee So-young, the new director of the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco—appointed in April after serving as chief curator at Harvard Art Museum and Met’s first Korean art curator—aims to reframe Asian culture through a diasporic and contemporary lens. She emphasizes that Asian American identity is multifaceted, with each artist exploring unique hybrid experiences, and advocates for museums to showcase Asia not as a historical artifact but as a “vibrant current community” shaping global culture.
Under Lee’s leadership, the museum, which is the home to 20,000 works from 48 Asian countries, will strengthen collaborations with regional institutions and highlight contemporary diasporic voices. Lee cites her 2013 curated exhibition “Silla: Korea’s Golden Kingdom” as a model for presenting historical Asian art with modern relevance, while noting the explosive rise of Korean contemporary art as transformative for global landscapes. Her vision aligns with San Francisco’s post-pandemic cultural revitalization, positioning the museum as a dynamic space for community engagement and cross-cultural storytelling.
News Source: https://www.koreaherald.com/article/10582787
(3) Central Asia Has a New Cultural Hub: Bukhara Biennial 2025
(Photo Credit: Bukhara Biennial 2025)
The Bukhara Biennial, launched in September 2025 across UNESCO-listed historic landmarks in Uzbekistan, positions Central Asia as a emerging global cultural hub by transforming ancient caravanserais, madrassas, and public squares into platforms for contemporary art. Directed by Gayane Umerova of the Art and Culture Development Foundation, the biennial aligns with President Shavkat Mirziyoyev’s national cultural renaissance, aiming to activate heritage sites through international collaborations and redefine Bukhara—a UNESCO Creative City of Craft & Folk Art—as a dynamic space for modern creative dialogue.
Curated around the theme “Recipes for Broken Hearts,” the biennial reimagines Bukhara’s Silk Road legacy as a metaphor for emotional and cultural healing, blending visual arts, design, music, and cuisine into collective rituals. Artistic Director Diana Campbell emphasized its role as a “free and open forum” fostering cross-cultural connections, echoing the city’s history as a hub for polymath Ibn Sina’s fusion of philosophy, medicine, and crafts. This approach transcended traditional exhibitions, integrating performances, textiles, and even culinary arts like the symbolic dish palovinto immersive public experiences.
Unlike typical biennials, Bukhara’s model leverages its unique heritage infrastructure to attract global artists and investors, presenting the city not as an open-air museum but as a living ecosystem where ancient and contemporary practices merge. By collaborating with chefs, artisans, and musicians to create new “recipes” of resilience, the event highlights Central Asia’s dual identity as both custodian of tradition and laboratory for innovative ideas, establishing a distinctive narrative on the international stage alongside established events like Venice or Documenta.
News Source: https://impakter.com/bukhara-biennial-2025-central-asia/
(4) The global art market churn may be good for Indian art. Art Basel Hong Kong Director’s first India visit is proof
(Photo Credit: Art Basel)
Angelle Siyang-Le, director of Art Basel Hong Kong(ABHK), visited India to deepen ties with the local art scene, meeting stakeholders in Delhi, Ahmedabad, and Mumbai to understand India’s role in the global art landscape. Her trip aimed to address the plateauing participation of Indian galleries at ABHK, which has fluctuated between 4–9 exhibitors annually since 2016, by re-engaging past participants like Chemould Prescott Road and welcoming new ones such as Shrine Empire and Anant Art. Acknowledging post-pandemic financial constraints, Angelle emphasized the need to support galleries in leveraging ABHK as a bridge between Eastern and Western art communities.
While Vadehra Art Gallery, Tarq and Jhaveri Contemporary have been religiously participating through the years, erstwhile regulars like Chemould Prescott Road and Experimenter have sat out several editions. This year’s fair included two new additions – Shrine Empire and Anant Art. For Angelle, this trip was about “re-establishing these ties”.
Indian art rarely falls in the top end. MF Husain’s Gram Yatra that fetched $13.8 million, the most expensive Indian art work to be sold at an auction, is the only work from the country that breaches the $10 million mark. With the majority of our art falling below the $10 million segment, India has emerged as an ideal market for collectors and art fairs, including ABHK, in the current times.
