Sotheby’s Hong Kong will hold its Spring Sales between Apr 3rd and 8th. There will be an estimated HK$1 billion (US$128 million) worth of art, jewellery and wine on offer. In the Modern and Contemporary Southeast Asian Paintings category, there are the usual names such as Lee Man Fong, Le Pho and Affandi, along with a group of my favourite Singaporean pioneer artists - Georgette Chen, Cheong Soo Pieng and Chen Wen Hsi. One very exciting piece offered for sale is Masriadi’s I’m Still Lucky (Left), an iconic work by the young Indonesian painter who keeps his collectors keen by producing just a few works each year. In the heydays of 2008, one Masriadi work broke the US$1 million mark; his prices fell back last year, but this large work, which is fresh to the market, is likely to be highly fought over and could go for well above the estimate of $103,000- $193,000. The piece depicts the sport of wrestling and has all the humorous visual elements that are iconic of Masriadi’s most interesting works. The powerful muscular men take centre-stage while the background is occupied by chatting spectators whose conversations are transcribed in characteristic dialogue bubbles.
There is also a monumental piece by Indonesian artist Agus Suwage (right), another influential figure in the contemporary Indonesian art arena. The self-portraiture piece was part of a semi-retrospective exhibition the artist had last year in Indonesia. If you want to know more about this artist, read
this IHT story I wrote in October 2009
One of my favourite pieces is Rebel Optic (left) by Ronald Ventura. I met this interesting Filipino artist a couple of years ago when I wrote a piece for his exhibition catalogue for a show in Singapore. Some of his works can be strange and quite disturbing, but this one is actually quite visually engaging, though still very dark. As usual there is more to it than meets the eye. Cartoon icons are shown decaying, hovering over the face of the artist’s nephew, a reference to our superficial world, perhaps?
Sotheby’s is showing previews of its auction around the region:
12th-13th March Shanghai (Shanghai JC Mandarin)
15th-16th March Beijing (The St. Regis Beijing)
20th-21st March Singapore (The Regent Singapore)
23rd-24th March Bangkok (The Sukhothai)
27th-28th March Taipei (Cathay Financial Center)
