The Asian Art Museum’s world-renowned collection featuring more than 15,000 objects representing countries and cultures throughout Asia will be the subject of a series of 6 free lectures offered throughout the fall at San Francisco’s Chinese Culture Center entitled 6,000 Years of Grandeur: Exploring the Asian Art Museum’s Collection. Members of the Asian Art Museum’s Community Speakers Program will present the lectures ranging in topics from Chinese and Japanese brush painting and Chinese imperial treasures, to the art of the Himalayas and recent archaeological finds in China. The speakers are volunteers from the museum’s Docent Council, all of whom have passed a rigorous three-year college-accredited course on the arts of Asia. The presentations are offered on select Saturday mornings at 10:30 AM throughout the fall and early winter, beginning on September 21 (full schedule offered below). The 45-minute presentations free to the public will be presented at the Chinese Culture Center, 750 Kearny Street, Third Floor (inside the Chinatown Holiday Inn), San Francisco, CA 94108.

About the Asian Art Museum

Opened in 1966 as a result of a gift to the City of San Francisco by industrialist Avery Brundage, the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco is one of the largest museums in the Western world devoted exclusively to Asian art. Its holdings include more than 15,000 Asian art objects spanning 6,000 years of history and representing numerous countries and cultures throughout Asia. The collections serve as the basis for exhibition, research, education, and loan activities. To fulfill its mission, the museum strives to increase the breadth of its collections, enhance relationships with local constituencies and Asian cultures, and expand exhibitions and program-related activities. The museum uses its resources to make Asia accessible to a diverse and rapidly expanding Asian-descendant populace searching for a meaningful and comprehensible introduction to its cultural heritage, and to a non-Asian populace wishing to be introduced to traditions and cultures that play an increasingly prominent role in international affairs.

About the New Asian Opening January 23, 2003

Having long outgrown its home of 35 years in Golden Gate Park, the museum will open its new, expanded facility at the San Francisco’s Civic Center on Thursday, January 23, 2003, at 10:00 am. The date coincides with the celebration of the Lunar New Year, the traditional start of the year for many Asian cultures and an auspicious season symbolizing new beginnings. The grand opening will be the culmination of an eight-year, $160.5 million public/private partnership to create a new home for the museum and its world-renowned collection of Asian art through the rehabilitation and adaptive reuse of the city’s former Main Library, a 1917 beaux arts style building. Italian architect Gae Aulenti, best known for converting a derelict Paris train station into the celebrated Musée d’Orsay, conceived the transformation of the historic building into the new Asian Art Museum. To date, more than $154 million of the $160.5 million capital campaign has been secured, including $52 million in public bonds. The single largest private gift, $15 million, came from Korean-born Silicon Valley entrepreneur Chong-Moon Lee. In acknowledgment of Mr. Lee’s generosity, the new building will be officially recognized as the Asian Art Museum Chong-Moon Lee Center for Asian Art and Culture. Featuring nearly 40,000 square feet of gallery display space as well as expanded educational services, state-of-the-art storage and conservation facilities, and more the new quarters will allow the museum to better fulfill its mission of leading a diverse global audience in discovering the unique material, aesthetic, and intellectual achievements of Asian art and culture. For more information, visit www.asianart.org.