NEW YORK—Rare artworks, both ancient and contemporary, from all over the East await bidders at New York’s Asia Week sales, September 15 through 19. A Christie’s auction of masterpieces from the collection of the Zimmerman family— who began amassing their trove, among the most important American collections of Himalayan art, in the 1960s—which takes place on the 15th. The highlight will no doubt be the 12th-century thangka, a painted Buddhist scroll from central Tibet (est. $600–800,000). Another Buddhist rarity, the remarkable 15th-century Ming Dynasty, Xuande period Tibeto- Chinese wood sculpture of the Guhyasadhana Avalokitesvara—an esoteric manifestation of the bodhisattva Avalokitesvara in mystical union with his female consort—hits the block on the 16th in Sotheby’s sale of Chinese works of art and ceramics. Because the piece is without auction precedent, it carries no published estimate. A more emblematic Chinese work, a Qianlong yellow- and green-glazed dragon jar with a mark (est. $600–800,000), is the showstopper at the Christie’s Fine Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art auction on September 17.  Fans of the Chinese artist Cai Guo-Qiang, whose recent Guggenheim exhibition in New York made headlines around the world, will be drawn to the Sotheby’s sale of contemporary Asian art, also on the 17th, where his Two Eagles, 2005 (est. $400–600,000), executed in gunpowder on paper, hits the block. Modern Korean master Park Sookeun (1914–1965), meanwhile, is represented at Christie’s auction of Japanese and Korean art on September 18 by his mixed media on board Figures in a Landscape, 1964 (est. $400–500,000). Not to be overlooked, on September 16, is Doyle’s Asian Works of Art sale, which includes a striking Chinese jade figure, 220–581, of a crouching chimera (est. $20—30,000).

"Asia Specific" originally appeared in the September 2008 issue of Art+Auction. For a complete list of articles from this issue available on ARTINFO, see Art+Auction's September 2008 Table of Contents.