Asia Art Weekly News Bulletin – ISSUE 35 Week of 6 October 2025
(1) Christie’s Hong Kong autumn sale drops 46% from last year but makes Picasso’s record in Asia
Overall auction sales by Sotheby’s, Christie’s and Phillips reflected art market downturn since 2016, despite the sale of Asia’s most expensive Picasso
(2) Asia NOW 2025 Challenges Notions of Asia as a Fixed Geography
Asia NOW returns to the Monnaie de Paris from 22 to 26 October with a VIP preview on Tuesday 21 October.The edition frames ‘Asia’ as a living field, with a particular emphasis on West and South Asia and other often overlooked regions.
(3) K-Pop Star RM Brings His Art Collection to a Museum for the First Time
“RM x SFMOMA” will surface selections from the pop star’s art trove, including works by Yun Hyong-Keun, Kim Yun Shin, and Philip Guston.
(4) HK, Singapore educators stress fostering youth growth, tradition in arts
The goals of the first three-year bachelor’s program in Asia’s contemporary Chinese theaters were raised on October 4 at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre during discussions about developing higher arts education in Singapore and Hong Kong.
(1) Christie’s Hong Kong autumn sale drops 46% from last year but makes Picasso’s record in Asia
(Photo Credit: The Christie’s)
Christie’s 20/21st Century Autumn sale in Hong Kong last month (26 September) made $72.6m, down 46% from last year’s equivalent sale and around the same as its sale in March. The evening marked the first anniversary of Christie’s Asia headquarters in Central’s Henderson building.
Still, the auction asserted that the city’s market remains solid despite regional and global economic doldrums. Picasso’s 1944 Buste de Femme set his Asia record price, hammering for HK$196.75m (US$25.4m) after a protracted competition between two bidders.
The sale included Kusama’s painting Pumpkin [TWAQN] and Zao’s 17.3.63, respectively selling for HK$34.66 mln (US$4.475 mln) and HK$85.2 mln (US$11 mln). The Zao and Picasso works joined with May’s sale of Jean-Michel Basquiat’s Sabado por la Noche as the most valuable 20th and 21st Century sales in Asia this year. Brennan also highlighted how the work of Walter Spies was influenced by his years in Indonesia; his Pagodenlandschaft (Landscape with a Pagoda by a Lake) sold for HK$26.1m ($3.3m).
Christie’s Asia Pacific head of 20th and 21st century art, Cristian Albu, described the sale’s composition as “trying to tell a story, and trying to give respect to the region,” with “chapters about Korean art, about Japanese art, about Asian art. But of course, we’re trying to build bridges between the Western art and the Eastern Art, because there’s no such a thing as boundaries between artists,” with “a great dialogue between Picasso and Zao Wou-ki, and between Korean art and between New York modernism and New York minimalism”.
News Source: https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2025/10/05/christies-hong-kong-autumn-sale-drops-46-from-last-year-but-makes-picassos-record-in-asia
(2) Asia NOW 2025 Challenges Notions of Asia as a Fixed Geography
(Photo Credit: OCULA)
Asia NOW, the premier Asian art fair, returns to Paris’s Monnaie de Paris from October 22–26, 2025, featuring a VIP preview on October 21. Its 11th edition brings together approximately 70 galleries from 28 Asian territories, showcasing solo and duo exhibitions. Returning participants like Tang Contemporary Art (Hong Kong/Beijing) and Kaikai Kiki (Tokyo) are joined by first-time entrants such as ARARIO Gallery (Seoul/Shanghai) and Baik Art (Seoul/Jakarta), reflecting the fair’s decade-long growth from 18 galleries in 2015 to a pan-Asian diaspora-inclusive platform.
Under the theme “Grow,” the fair reimagines Asia as a “methodology” rather than a fixed geography, highlighting rhizomatic growth through solidarity and shared practices. New sections like “The Third Space” (inspired by Homi Bhabha’s theory) feature cross-regional projects, such as Iranian artist Laila Tara H’s textile-sound works. Institutional collaborations with the Lahore Biennale Foundation, Kochi-Muziris Biennale, and Colomboscope (Sri Lanka) emphasize ecological awareness, temporality, and embodied resistance, while West Asian artists like Saudi Arabia’s Ahaad Alamoudi and Lebanon’s Pascal Hachem contribute installations and performances.
Asia NOW blends commercial galleries with performances, talks, and screenings, challenging traditional art fair models. Curator Anissa Touati notes its fluid approach to East-West dynamics, while Shanghai’s Rockbund Art Museum director X Zhu-Nowell praises it as “a fair that feels like a festival.” Amid a challenging global art market, the fair positions itself as a living ecology fostering alliances and affective communities, underscored by projects like Chinese artist Han Mengyun’s lunar poetry installation and its focus on collective growth beyond mere commerce.
News Source: https://ocula.com/magazine/art-news/asia-now-2025-challenges-notions-of-asia/
(3) K-Pop Star RM Brings His Art Collection to a Museum for the First Time
(Photo Credit: HYBE)
BTS leader RM (Kim Nam-joon) will debut his private art collection in the inaugural exhibition “RM x SFMOMA” at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) in October 2026, marking the first museum showcase of his curated contemporary works. The exhibition aims to bridge cultural and artistic divides by placing RM’s collection—featuring Korean modernists like Yun Hyong-Keun and international artists like KAWS—in dialogue with SFMOMA’s holdings, including pieces by Kim Whanki and Mark Rothko. RM described the project as a reflection on boundaries between “East and West, Korea and America,” inviting diverse public perspectives without prescribed interpretations.
RM’s passion for visual art, evident in his lyrics and social media, ignited during a transformative 2018 visit to the Art Institute of Chicago. Since then, he has documented visits to global institutions like Tate Modern and Frieze Seoul while building a significant collection spanning Korean pioneers (Park Soo Keun, Nam June Paik) and contemporary icons (Bearbrick, Philip Guston). The SFMOMA show will feature rarely seen works, including pieces by Korean modernists Park Rehyun and Chang Ucchin, abstract artist Kwon Okyon, and sculptor Kim Yun Shin, alongside loans from his previous contributions like Kwon Jin-Kyu’s sculpture.
SFMOMA Chief Curator Janet Bishop emphasized the exhibition’s role in fostering “new discoveries” through dialogues between RM’s contemplative collection and the museum’s acquisitions, such as works by Georgia O’Keeffe and Agnes Martin. RM frames art as essential to life, “like eating and sleeping”, and his collaboration with SFMOMA underscores a growing synergy between global music icons and institutional art spaces, positioning the show as a milestone in transcultural artistic exchange and the democratization of museum experiences.
News Source: https://news.artnet.com/art-world/rm-bts-art-collection-sfmoma-2695866
(4) HK, Singapore educators stress fostering youth growth, tradition in arts
(Photo Credit: IRIS MUK/CHINA DAILY)
Asia’s first three-year Bachelor of Arts (Honors) program in Contemporary Chinese Theaters was unveiled at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre, emphasizing the development of higher arts education in Singapore and Hong Kong. Organized by Zuni Icosahedron and the University of the Arts Singapore (UAS), the program—led by Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts (NAFA)—trains students in traditional Chinese opera techniques and modern interpretations, fostering awareness of historical, cultural, and linguistic contexts in Chinese theater. Associate Dean Rei Poh Cheng-leong highlighted its focus on blending inheritance of traditional forms with contemporary creativity and self-expression.
Artistic Director Mathias Woo of Zuni noted the program’s design facilitates dialogues with performers across Asian cultures, exploring diverse theatrical embodiments and addressing industry demands. With most students hailing from mainland China, the Chinese-language instruction provides accessible higher arts education in Singapore. UAS Vice-Chancellor Kwok Kian-woon emphasized theater’s role in resolving modern contradictions, such as technological advancements’ impact on humanity, while stressing that art creation rooted in tradition must remain open to innovation and mentorship-driven growth.
Educators agreed that arts education must equip youth with self-growth skills and resilience against global challenges. NAFA’s Wong Sun-tat and Nellie Seng underscored the need for real-world training through early internships and holistic artist development beyond technical mastery. Susan Yeung How-wah highlighted dance’s role in fostering discipline and perseverance, while Anna CY Chan of Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts urged broader educational dialogues. The program reinforces UAS’s pioneering role as Singapore’s first arts university, uniting LASALLE and NAFA to advance collaborative, future-ready arts education.
News Source: https://www.chinadailyasia.com/hk/article/621156
