Page 25 - C.T. Loo A paper about his impact and activities in the Chinese art Market

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(FCA), Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery (FGA), Worcester Art

Museum (WAM), and Toledo Art Museum. The materials from museums and archives

are supplemented by Loo’s own publications and articles on Loo’s exhibitions and

collections in periodicals and newspapers. The identification and study of Loo’s key

correspondence, objects, exhibitions/sales, and clients are key to this examination.

Chapters Three and Four examine how Loo recontextualized ancient Chinese art in

modern America. Chapter Three, Westernness and Chineseness, investigates Loo’s

repositioning of Chinese art from a spatial-cultural perspective. On the one hand, Loo

marketed the affinities of Chinese art to Western art. On the other, he emphasized native

contexts to enhance the authenticity and exotic charm of Chinese objects. Chapter Four,

Time and Timeless, looks at Loo’s negotiation of Chinese art’s identity from a temporal-

cultural point of view. Loo marketed Chinese antiquities’ ancientness as well as their

compatibility with Western modern aesthetics in response to rising nationalism in China

and the new needs in modern American society. The issue of identity was also manifested

in Loo’s personal history, and his justifications for the removal of Chinese antiquities for

America’s consumption. The sources consist primarily of Loo’s exhibition/sale

catalogues, exhibition reviews in the press, and major scholarship in Chinese art

produced in the first half of the twentieth century.

Chapter Five, Spectacle, focuses on Loo’s display strategies, which visually articulated

the power relations in his dealing. Loo transformed Chinese art into a spectacle, which

invited the imperialist, capitalist, and erotic gaze of the viewers in America. This part