I still have not made it over to the Indian Show at the Mori, but will get there before it closes on March 15.  Have heard good things.  An Australian gallerist wasn’t able to come to see us last weekend becuase he was so entranced.

I did make it once already to the National Art Center across from Tokyo Midtown for the Annual 5 University Graduation Show.  It’s wonderful that there is such a great facility for showcasing the graduation shows from Tokyo’s top art universities.  The building is beautiful.  [2 Big quibbles: 1. No permanent collection, and 2.  The coffess shop was not well-maintained--kind of dirty]

No quibbles with the show.  I saw the work of close to 1,000 artists from Joshibi, Tama, Musashino, Nihon University and Tokyo Zokei University.  In the Zokei show, I saw works from some of the friends of our artists, Gakushi Yamamoto.  Check out the “wood cocoon” in the center of Zokei’s sculpture.  Go inside and smell and feel.

Saw wome wonderful works from each university and wrote down contact information and gave out my name card to artists we are interested in talking further with.   Hitoshi went with me and I was surprised how much we agreed on what we liked. He said to me:  ”

We are not looking for good artists.  We are looking for great artists.  We found some great works and soon we will know if they are great artists.

People ask us, “where do you find your artists?’  This is one of the places.  After the initial contact, we will look at the portfolios and resumes and try to find out more about the artists and their aspirations.  Then, we make a decision about representation.

We noticed that there were many other gallerists there, some left cards, and some wrote notes in the artists’ books requesting contact.  I was happy that one of the artists I liked turned out to be an artist who won the painting prize at his school.  Also happy to see that Gakushi Yamamoto’s work was featured on the cover of Tokyo Zokei University’s bulletin for their scultpure program.

If I have time, I will get over there again today.

I loved the story on BBC of the 71 year old who was brought to court for the “serious crime” of rollerlading.  He is in great shape, by the way, was fined 300 pounds plus court costs for being a hazard to the public.  The poor bastard! I think most people would be jealous.  he never hurt anyone and he tries to stay fit.  What should he be doing?  Limping his way around slowly.  My hat is off to him.

You can see a video of his “art” here. Yes, the BBC said that some people call it art–he is certainly creating something new.  Some people told him to “act his age”.  He is!

Why shouldn’t a 71 year old rollerblade?  It certainly does not hurt his poularity: Mr Dornan has a 2,075-person Facebook group devoted to him.

Our sale began last week and got off to a good start.  The biggest surprise was the interest in large works and the interest in Chinese works.  As I wrote before, the works are good.  The market may have changed and the prices are lower, but I still love Zhu Wei and Wang Huai-Qing and the imagery of Wang Guang Yi strikes a chord with people.

All of the explaining I did made me recognize how many of our artists are philosophers.  I must be attracted to these kinds of works where the artist was pondering some big issues, like giving meaning to life.

A german visitor came to the gallery and told me how much the gallery had changed:  There is so much color here now.

It must be true.  I think I am feeling happier, more energetic and the gallery choices reflect that too.  I really like black and white works, but the colorful works do bring some energy into a room.

Joji Shimamoto came by the gallery too and we discussed his show which opens on March 6 with more than 40 of his photographs.  We will have an opening party for him-before he leaves for several months of travel outside Japan.

What else, getting ready for Art Night at beacon, March 30–planning the event and choosing the art.  This will be a night when we introduce new works from several of our younger artists like Atsushi Takahashi, Masumi Yoshida and Gakushi Yamamoto.

Today is off to a great start.  Watched the mejiro–small Japanese green birds with white eyes-feed on our large  jade plant’s flowers on our balcony and opened up a new box of Dorset Cereals Super Cranberry, Cherry and Almond Cereal.

Pure heaven.  Dorset cereal for breakfast.  This is a work of art from the UK-a ton of cranberries, cherries and almonds with raisins and nuts in a bed of cereal.

I like the way it looks in one of the new bowls from Ryota Aoki–a nice blending of cultures.  English cereal–they must have been at it for a long time, and the Japanese white bowls with a green glaze at the top.

I highly recommend this cereal–not only as a work of art but for the taste as well.  You can get it at Meiji Supermarket and at National Azabu.  They have a great website which I haven’t had a chance to explore yet:  www.dorsetcereals.co.uk and a wide variety of products which are not yet available in Japan.

I think you will like the packaging too.  I bet this is an old company that went through some re-invention.  The result is beautiful.

Yesterday was the final day for our portrait show, so after the gallery closed, Hitoshi and I stayed late and “took the show down” and started getting ready for our Winter Sale which starts on Thursday.

We have had a winter sale every year, but this year we have more than 200 items and what is included in our sale reflects some of the shifts we are making in the gallery.  Recently we focus on younger Japanese, Chinese, Indonesian and Thai artists, so much of the work is from artists that we are not working with as closely anymore.

Some the names are like a who’s who in Japanese art:  Shinichi Nakazawa, Katsunori Hamanishi, Yoshio Imamura as well as a lot of individual works that we have had in the gallery and in our storage area.  We have some paintings from Michiko Fujii as well whose work was also quite popular in the gallery and whom we continue to work with.  We also have some of the large works from Reishi Kusaka in the gallery on sale too. We love his work but have little space for these large works now.

Some of the Japanese individual works are reduced as much as 50-70% .

From Thailand, we have work from Attasit, Yanawit and Tinnakorn whom I have known since we started the gallery.  Attasit has become quite famous for his paintings–and even in this market, they have been getting record prices.

From Indonesia, we have a work from Untung that won the President’s Award in Indonesia, a painting from Nengha Sujenah and some works from Agus Purnomo, including one huge painting of numbers.

We have a ton of American works on sale too, including prints that we sold for 20,000 yen framed and will sell for only 5,000 yen. A NY artist visited us last week and saw that we had James Siena and freaked out–saying he is very big in New York.  We have four of his prints, including two very large ones, that will also be included in the sale along with Robert Motherwell’s work and work from Katia Santibanez, another rising star in New York.

Gonna run to the gallery now to do more preparation.  The sale will open on Thursday at 11 AM in two locations–both in Azabu Juban near Roppongi Hills. One is our regular gallery and the other is a rental space we have for the sale-it’s across from the Gourmet City Supermarket–just look for the big “10″ and we will be there.

Went to the– NADIFF Building in Ebisu where there are a few galleries and a wonderful bookstore.  The bookstore has such a wide selection of items -almost like a museum gift shop, except more books.  They have a ton of  books in English too.  A good place to start if you want to know what is going on in Japanese art.

I couldn’t help get gallery envy when I went up to the second and third floors.  The spaces are perfect for showing art-high ceilings, picture rails, nice floors, whitewalls.  Oh, I wish we had a space like that, I thought–and the art lovers do seem to come. Did not have art envy–I like what we show–just gallery space envy.

Today, as I reflect a bit, the spaces do seem sterile–and why do so many galleries have to have those high counters that separate the staff from the visitors?

I like our gallery–no counters to hide behind.  We are out there with everyone and try not to get in people’s way as they look around.  It is part of our philosophy to engage people with the art.  Living with art, we say.

Also visited some Ginza galleries–I think it is a misnomer to call them galleries–so many are just spaces with conference rooms with a few works hung randomly. The dealer and a few of his customers or friends are just hanging around and talking-or maybe dealing?

Many of the so-called Ginza galleries certainly do not welcome visitors and  give you the feeling that they wish you would stay outside.  They do not have counters but a psychological barrier that is not possible to penetrate.

There are a few ginza galleries that I like-that have actual shows, but so many are small places that just service their regular customers.  When people talk about the Ginza galleries, what are they talking about–the few places that mount real exhibitions, or the whole Ginza art scene?  In any case, it’s not a place where you can enjoy looking at art.

Made it to Ginza last night for one of the smaller auction house’s monthly auctions.   One of the staff members told me they’ve moved to this monthly auction with photocopied catalog instead of an elaborate printed catalog with auctions 3 or 4 times per year.

It was really a low budget affair–no snacks, no drinks, no projection, no microphone, no tuxedoed auctioneers– but it all worked.  Most of the lots sold unlike recent Christies and Sothebys auctions where so many works passed.

I was the only foreigner there on the bidding floor.  There were many bargains-but some works couldn’t even sell for 3,000 yen.  The most popular item was a painting by an Italian artist that went for more than the high estimate.  Most items went for their low estimate.  I lusted after some “large lemons” by Donald Sultan.  That print went for just 100,000 yen.  The framing alone was worth 50,000 yen.

The audience was mostly dealers.  The collectors seem to have abandoned these auctions now.  The auctioneer seemed to know many of them and he did his best to coax even an extra 1,000 yen out of the bidders.  Usually at auctions, the bids go up in 10,000 increments, but last night, the bidding would reach a point like 50,000 and someone would bid 51,000 or 52,000.  I thought people were going to start bidding in 100 yen increments, but that would have been obnoxious and taken forever.

This kind of auction is a good opportunity for dealers and collectors to sell their works very quickly and for dealers to load up on stock that would be impossible to find if the economic situation was different.

The biggest losers:  No surprise that works by Takashi Murakami and Yayoi Kusama sold very cheaply or not at all–you can get a Yayoi pumpkin these days for 50,000 at these auctions.[ Before they sold for more than 150,000 yen].  The big surprise for me was that Mizuma’s gallery artists did not sell well–especially their prints.  I think other dealers do not make a market in his works at all.

Been the time for reunions lately.  Hitoshi and I met my cousin and his wife here–I had not seen them for more than 15 years, maybe more.  He has become a famous economist and she is an artist–with a Ph.d D. from Harvard in organic chemistry.  She has found what she loves and is quite good.  My cousin, Dennis Carlton, teaches at the University of Chicago.  I loved what they said to me:

You look the same as you did fifteen years ago.  Maybe a little less hair, but the same.

I think they were so kind.  A lot less hair and not the same.

Hitoshi’s junior high school friend came to the gallery on Wednesday.  She told him the same thing–that he looked the same and hadn’t changed.  She gave me some good insight into his character too.

He always liked perfect.  His hair, his clothes, his car.  Perfect.

I guess he has always been this way.  Me.  Quite different!

She brought us mentaiko senbei–they are from Fukuoka after all–great tasting.  I will post a pic later of the box and their website.  Worth getting.

Also, here’s a close-up pic of Ono Kouseki’s work that just arrived.  We will have three of them in the art night at beacon on March 30.  Price ranges from about 150,000 yen to 420,00.   I love them–very interesting techniques and gives you a very peaceful feeling too. I hope he wins the Shiseido Egg, but still to be one of the three finalists is quite an accomplishment.  The winner will be announced after art night at beacon.

Been busy this week with the last week of our Portrait Show and also hanging some works at the Intercontinental/ANA Hotel.  If you have a chance, please get over there and take a look.  We have several works from Tomoya Tsukamoto as well as the Zhu Wei Bull and some prints on the 2nd and 3rd Floor.  They look good and seem to make a big difference in the appearance of the hotel lobbies.  The hotel has done some renovations and looks good–I was impressed with the improvements in the breakfast and the restaurants were busy for lunch.

We also are getting ready for our “art night at beacon” which will take place on March 30 at beacon chop house.  This is a terrific restaurant and we are partnering with them to host an art night with many items for sale and some to be sold as silent auction items.  The sales will benefit 2nd Harvest Japan.  I’m excited that we will have work for sale from Ono Kouseki who is one of the finalists in the Shiseido Egg Contest, one of the top 3 selected by Shiseido Museum from a group of over 300 applicants.

We are also getting ready for our annual winter sale which will start next Thursday.  This will be even bigger than last year–more works–and two locations.

We will have more than 200 works, including work from Japan, China, Indonesia and Thailand-many items 10-70% off.  The artists include some of our gallery favorites like Katsunori Hamanishi, Noe Aoki, Yanawit Kunchaethong, Shinichi Nakazawa, Sunaryo,Wang Guang Yi, Agus Purnomo and some of the works by Takanobu Kobayashi too.

We started to empty out our storage  and will have some works from American artists like Robert Motherwell, James Siena and Bruce Cohen available too.