A Century of Modern Design: the Collection of Kai-Yin Lo
Hong Kong-based collector Kai-Yin Lo amassed an extraordinary collection that reflects inspiration, innovation and scholarship. The collection of modern and contemporary design is global in its scope and vast in its chronological sweep.
現代設計的世紀回顧——羅啟妍女士收藏
現居香港的藏家羅啟妍豐富非凡的典藏，不僅深具啟發、創新以及學術精神，這個著眼於現代及當代設計的收藏，深具國際視野，也廣泛橫跨了各個發展時期。
Artek, Finland
Sotheby’s, London, ‘Modern & Contemporary Design’, 18 October 2008, lot 12
Acquired from the above by the present owner
Juhani Pallasmaa, ed., Alvar Aalto Furniture, exh. cat., Museum of Finnish Architecture, Helsinki, 1984, pp. 12, 76, 80, 86-89, 91, 126, 132-33
Pirkko Tuukkanen, ed., Alvar Aalto Designer, Vammala, 2002, pp. 18, 71, 160, 165
Nina Stritzler-Levine, ed., Artek and the Aaltos: Creating a Modern World, exh. cat., Bard Graduate Center, New York, 2016, throughout
Finnish • 1898 - 1976
In contrast with the functionalism of the International Style (as well the neoclassicism put forward by the Nazi and Soviet regimes), Alvar Aalto brought a refreshing breath of humanism to modern design: "True architecture exists only where man stands in the center," he wrote. Aalto designed furniture in stack-laminated plywood composed of Finnish birch, which was cost-effective and lent warmth to his interiors. Aalto also revived Finnish glass design with his entries in the various Karhula-Iitala glassworks competitions throughout the 1930s.
In 1936 he won first place for a collection of colorful, wavy vases in various sizes titled Eskimoerindens skinnbuxa (The Eskimo Woman’s Leather Breeches). The vases were an immediate success and the most popular size, now known as the "Savoy" vase, is still in production today. Aalto's freeform designs, in harmony with human needs and nature, anticipated the organic modernism of the 1950s and 1960s; in particular, his innovations in bent plywood had a major impact on designers such as Charles and Ray Eames.
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