Chinese rhinoceros horn cups and gilded Buddhas have been unfashionable among collectors of Asian art for decades. But with the recent frenzy for Chinese art, especially among new Chinese buyers, taste is undergoing a radical shift.

A rare, carved rhino cup shaped like a boat is expected to fetch as much as $1.8 million, while a gold-clad Ming Dynasty Buddha is estimated at up to $4.5 million at New York’s Asia Week auctions that begin March 19.

In addition to two major art fairs and 17 Asian art gallery exhibitions at the Fuller Building (41 E. 57th St.), Sotheby’s and Christie’s are holding 11 auctions of Chinese, Indian, Southeast Asian, Korean and Japanese art. The week’s sales are estimated to tally $136.4 million, which would be the highest Asia Week total.

Auction results will likely reflect chaotic price spikes as newly wealthy Asian buyers clamor to bring home Chinese art while speculating on a rising market.

There isn’t an Apollo Fund for art, but people are buying it like that,” said dealer James Lally of New York’s J.J. Lally & Co. “Many people in Asia want to become members of the cultured community, and they want to make money doing it.”

Goldman Sachs managing director Henry Cornell and the Albright-Knox Art Gallery in Buffalo, New York, are among sellers who are taking advantage of skyrocketing prices for Asian art.

Posted: 03|15|07 at 8:47 am. Filed under: US News.