2021 Asia Arts Game Changer Awards

Asia Arts Game Changer Awards
Wednesday, May 5, 2021
7:30 PM (ET) Special Performance by Joyce Ho
8:00 PM (ET) Awards Ceremony and Auction

HONORING

Dr. Uli Sigg
Parviz Tanavoli
Zarina (In Memoriam)
Zhang Huan

With Special Appearances by: Roland Augustine, Jonah Bokaer, Adrian Keller, Rudresh Mahanthappa, Paul Miller (aka DJ Spooky), Kiran Nadar, Viet Thanh Nguyen, Eiko Otake, Her Majesty Farah Pahlavi, Suhanya Raffel, Patti Smith, Herb Tam, Muna Tseng, Wu Hung, among others.

To purchase tickets, please contact asiaartsawards@asiasociety.org

The 2021 Asia Arts Game Changer Awards Art Auction is now closed. The auction featured work by Ghiora Aharoni, Abir Karmakar, Izumi Kato, Kimsooja, Wilson Shieh, Tsang Kin-Wah, Wu Chi-Tsung, and Xiaoze Xie, as well as a limited edition print portfolio with work by Amanda Heng, Michael Lin, Lin Tianmiao, Jiha Moon, Navin Rawanchaikul, Nilima Sheikh, Yuken Teruya, and Wong Hoy Cheong.

Asia Arts Game Changer Awards is a signature gala celebration honoring visionaries across the arts field making an impact in the world. Major art collectors, artists, gallerists, dignitaries from the art world, and Asia Society trustees and patrons will gather online to celebrate the contemporary arts in Asia for their significant contributions.

For more than thirty years, Asia Society has been a pioneer in identifying and fostering contemporary Asian artists and engaging new audiences in their work.

Past honorees include: Christine Ay Tjoe, Cai Guo-Qiang, Fang Lijun, Subodh Gupta, Hon Chi Fun, Shirazeh Houshiary, Ju Ming, Bharti Kher, Lee Ufan, Liu Guosong, Nalini Malani, Nyoman Masriadi, Takashi Murakami, Yoshitomo Nara, Park Seo-Bo, Imran Qureshi, Rashid Rana, Shahzia Sikander, Hiroshi Sugimoto, Do Ho Suh, Natee Utarit, Wucius Wong, Xu Bing, Zeng Fanzhi, and Zhang Xiaogang.

All proceeds from Asia Arts Game Changer Awards support Asia Society’s global Arts & Culture initiatives.

Performance by Joyce Ho supported by Taipei Cultural Center in New York, Ministry of Culture, Republic of China (Taiwan).

Please contact AsiaArtsAwards@AsiaSociety.org for more information.

Honorees

Dr. Uli Sigg

Dr. Uli Sigg is one of the leading collectors and champions of contemporary Chinese art. He received a PhD from the law faculty of the Universität Zürich. Dr. Sigg served as Vice Chairman of the Schindler Group, establishing the first joint venture between China and the West in 1980. From 1995 to 1999 he was Swiss ambassador to China, North Korea, and Mongolia. During this period, Dr. Sigg began collecting contemporary Chinese art, eventually amassing more than twenty-five hundred works that have been exhibited internationally. In 2012, he gifted over half his collection to M+, Hong Kong. His significant contributions to the field include founding the Chinese Contemporary Art Award in 1997 (known as the Sigg Prize since 2020) and the CCAA Art Critic Award. Dr. Sigg is on the boards of Asia Society Switzerland and M+; the International Council of the Museum of Modern Art, New York; and the International Advisory Council of Tate, London.

Parviz Tanavoli

Parviz Tanavoli is an Iranian painter, sculptor, and poet known for his iconic heech sculptures. The artist graduated from Brera Academy in Milan in 1959. Tanavoli was a founding member of the Saqqakhaneh school, the first modern art movement in Iran. His practice incorporates modernist aesthetics with traditional motifs including handicrafts and Persian literature. Tanavoli has exhibited at the Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art (2017 and 2003); Tate Modern, London (2015); Asia Society Museum, New York (2013); the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (2012); the British Museum, London (2011); Minneapolis Institute of Art (1962); and the Venice Biennale (1958). His work is in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art; the British Museum; Tate Modern; Museum of Modern Art, Vienna; the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi; Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art; and National Museum of Qatar, Doha, among others. He served as a professor at the Tehran College of Decorative Arts and the Minneapolis College of Art and Design and as the head of the sculpture department at the University of Tehran.

Zarina

Zarina was a printmaker whose minimal compositions reflect her mathematics training and interest in architecture. Her work references notions of home, borders, displacement, and memory while her use of calligraphic inscriptions in Urdu demonstrates the vital role language plays in her work. Zarina received a BS from Aligarh Muslim University in 1958 and studied printmaking in Bangkok, Tokyo, and Paris before settling in New York. She was the subject of a retrospective exhibition at the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles (2012), which traveled to the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, and the Art Institute of Chicago (2013). She participated in the Venice Biennale (2011) and was the subject of a solo exhibition at the Pulitzer Arts Foundation, St. Louis (2019–2020). Her work is in the collections of Tate Modern, London; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum; the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; the Museum of Modern Art, New York; and the Menil Collection, Houston, among others.

Zhang Huan

Zhang Huan is best known for his provocative durational performances and as a pioneering founder of the Beijing East Village group. He received an MA from the Central Academy of Fine Arts, Beijing, in 1993. His practice spans large-scale participatory performances, sculpture, installation, and painting that often addresses Chinese culture and history. He was the subject of a retrospective at Asia Society Museum, New York (2007), which traveled to Vancouver Art Gallery (2008). Zhang has exhibited at the Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg (2020); the National Gallery of Singapore (2019); Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo (2018); MoMA PS1, New York (2018); M+, Hong Kong (2015); Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto (2012); Rockbund Art Museum, Shanghai (2011); Museum of Contemporary Art, Taipei (2010); Royal Academy of Arts, London (2007). His work is in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; the Centre Pompidou, Paris; Louvre Abu Dhabi; National Gallery of Australia, Canberra; and Shanghai Art Museum.

SPECIAL PERFORMANCE

An Artist Talk is a live virtual performance by interdisciplinary artist Joyce Ho that appropriates the structure of a lecture to reimagine daily rituals. The performance manipulates our awareness of time to expose tiny fissures within our daily routines. By magnifying easily overlooked details, the work sparks reflection on everyday life.

Joyce Ho is an interdisciplinary artist with a focus on installation, sculpture, and performance. She has exhibited internationally, including at the Yokohama Museum of Art, Yokohama, Japan (2020); Power Station of Art, Shanghai, China (2019); 9th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art, Queensland Art Gallery and Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane, Australia (2018); Busan Biennale (2014); and the Asian Art Biennial, National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts, Taichung (2013). Ho lives and works in Taipei, Taiwan.

SPECIAL THANKS TO:

VISIONARIES

Betsy & Ed Cohen

INNOVATORS

Pace Gallery

Lulu & Anthony Wang

SUPPORTERS

J. Frank Brown

Lutron Electronics Co., Inc.

Asheet Mehta

Jason Nazmiyal

Denise & Andrew Saul

DONORS

Asia Society Korea

Fernando Zobel de Ayala 

Carol Gluck

George Hicks

Carolyn Hsu-Balcer and Rene Balcer

Mitch and Joleen Julis

Nezhat Khosrowshahi

Kukje Gallery

Helen & William Little

Mohammed Afkhami Foundation 

Lei Morfino

Sakshi Gallery

Harit Talwar

Allison Tolman

Beili Wang

GIFTS IN KIND Ghiora Aharoni, Abir Karmakar and Galerie Mirchandani + Steinruecke, Izumi Kato and Perrotin, Kimsooja, Wilson Shieh, Tsang Kin-Wah, Wu Chi-Tsung, Xiaoze Xie and Chambers Fine Art