How the Other Half Collected

If you missed the sublime exhibition “Images of the Divine: South and Southeast Asian Sculpture from the Mr. and Mrs. John D. Rockefeller III Collection” (which just closed at Asia Society Museum in January), know that the gods are smiling on you. Opening tomorrow is a breathtaking show of over 150 works titled “A Passion for Asia: The Rockefeller Family Collects,” which offers another opportunity to see masterpieces from one of the most spectacular collections of Asian art in the United States.“A Passion for Asia” celebrates the 50th anniversary of the Asia Society’s founding by John D. Rockefeller III.Cocurated by Vishakha Desai and Adriana Proser, it is a dreamy romp through various places and periods, from China to Japan to Pakistan to Java; from the second century through the 20th.The beautifully paced exhibition is arranged, with near-perfect pitch, in four sections on two floors. The show features roughly half of the Rockefellers’ bequeathed collection of Asian art,as well as important loans from public and private collections; it includes some of the same amazing Buddhas, bodhisattvas, and Hindu gods and goddesses shown in “Images of the Divine.” It is also rich in ceramics, screens, textiles, furniture, paintings, and prints, as well as archival documents and artifacts – the Rockefellers’ letters, diaries, invoices, and passports – and even a key to the city of Seoul, which was awarded to JDR III in 1965.The Rockefellers had great taste, and almost every piece in “A Passion for Asia” is first-rate. Kenzo Okada’s oil “The Wave” (1959), a confused mix of Japanese painting and European Modernism, is the only truly suspect work on view.Isamu Noguchi’s “Mr. One Man” (Japan, 1952), in unglazed stoneware, is a wondrous conflation of warrior, creature, and vessel. “Bottle” (North China, 12th century), a black and white stoneware with sgraffito design in slip under glaze, and “Vase” (China, Ming period), a porcelaneous ware vase with cloisonne style decoration, are floral tours de force. “Female Deity (possibly Uma)” (Thailand, mid-11th century) and “Bodhisattva” (China, first half of the eighth century), a lifesize marble sculpture with Greco-Roman influences, are perfect distillations of sensuousness, classicism, and restraint.Installed amid numerous photographs of the Rockefellers and of the exhibition’s works in situ at the family’s various houses, gardens, and estates,”A Passion for Asia” is not only an intimate and exotic tour of Asian masterpieces, it is also Architectural Digest meets divine sanctuary.This one-two punch sets extreme wealth and extravagance in tension with works of extreme inwardness, serenity, and spiritual calm.The family photographs and documents are important and interesting, and seeing the Rockefellers’ over the top yet tasteful installations of the art can set your heart racing with envy, but I wonder how much of it is really necessary in anything but book form. More of the archival areas of the exhibition, which cannot compete with the individual power of the works themselves, should have been given over to the collection (rather than to the collecting) of art.Understandably, the exhibition’s focus is not merely on the Rockefellers’ artworks but also on the founding and founders of the Asia Society, an extremely important venue that continues to unite East and West; but we must not lose sight of what is really important in a museum setting. At times “A Passion for Asia” leans too much toward a celebration of the wealth and power of the Rockefellers rather than of the wealth and power of art.February 24 through September 3 (725 Park Avenue at 70th Street, 212-288-6400).

How the Other Half Collected

How the Other Half Collected

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