Brendan Lynch Appointed New Chairman of Asia Week New York
New York: Brendan Lynch has been named the new Chairman of Asia Week New York, the collaboration of prominent international Asian art galleries, six major auction houses, and numerous museums and Asian cultural institutions.
“I am honored to be the new chairman of this illustrious association of galleries and auction houses devoted to the promotion of Asian art,” says Lynch, whose London-based gallery, Oliver Forge and Brendan Lynch, Ltd., specializes in Indian, Islamic and Himalayan art, as well as Greek, Roman and Egyptian antiquities. “As we head into our milestone 15th anniversary, I look forward to maintaining the high standards of excellence promoted by our members. Much has been achieved in the sale and promotion of works of art and paintings from China, Japan, India, and the Himalayas, with the resulting acquisition of diverse works and masterpieces by some of the world’s great institutions. It is my intent to expand the scope of our association by building upon these strengths and encouraging new interest in Asian art.”
About Brendan Lynch
Brendan Lynch was born and raised in Waterford, Ireland. In 1977, at the age of 19, he was offered a summer job at Sotheby’s in London and was subsequently retained as a specialist to run sales in Indian, Himalayan, Southeast Asian and Islamic art, becoming Director of that department in 1990. While continuing to run the London sales, Lynch established the first regular Indian art sales in New York in 1985, and in the 1990s spearheaded new markets with annual exhibitions in Istanbul, followed by Sotheby’s’ first auction in India.
In 1997, after twenty years at the auction house, he with Oliver Forge, the director of the Antiquities Department at Sotheby’s, left the company to establish Oliver Forge and Brendan Lynch Ltd., independent consultants, and dealers.
About Oliver Forge and Brendan Lynch Ltd.
The gallery specializes in arranging private sales of Art of the Islamic World, Indian and Himalayan Art including Miniature Painting and Manuscripts, as well as Greek, Roman and Egyptian Antiquities, often acting on behalf of vendors to conclude sales to collectors and museums. They exhibit three times a year: Indian Painting during Asia Week, New York each March, since 2009, Antiquities each June and Islamic Art each October, the latter two in London at their Pall Mall galleries in St. James’s.
Among the institutions the gallery has sold to over the past 25 years are the British Museum and Victoria & Albert Museum, London as well as the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, Cleveland Museum of Art, the Getty Villa Museum, in Los Angeles, the Princeton University Art Museum, the Detroit Institute of Arts, the Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, at Cornell University, the Asian Art Museum, San Francisco, the Freer Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., the David Collection, in Copenhagen, the Rietberg Museum, Zurich, the Sadberk Hanim Museum, in Istanbul, the Louvre Abu Dhabi, Dar al-Athar al-Islamiyyah, Kuwait, the Asian Civilisations Museum, Singapore and the National Museum of Korea, Seoul.
