Yeni Mao, Siamese Bird Vase (2007) (artwareeditions.com $250)This limited-edition vase has it all: It’s functional, collectible and affordable. The idea grew out of this first-generation American artist’s residency in China. Each piece is in porcelain and is signed and numbered, but you’d better hurry: There are only 150 of them.
Gustav Klimt painter’s smock (Neue Galerie, 1048 Fifth Avenue, 212-628-6200; $300) Know someone who’s a bit creative but lacks the necessary inspiration? Give them this replica of the smock Gustav Klimt wore while painting such masterpieces as his portrait of Adele Bloch Bauer. It’s 100 percent linen, and costs a lot less than the $135 million the canvas fetched.
30,000 Years of Art (Phaidon Books, $49.95) The perfect gift for art illiterates, this book lays out the entire history of art in simple chronological order via 1,000 representative masterworks. Here you’ll find the
Venus De Milo right next to Mayan murals without all the usual historical folderol. It’s connoisseurship made easy!
Guggenheim Snow Globe (guggenheim.stores.yahoo.net, $15) Sure, this is a little cheesy, but then so was the Guggenheim’s “Art of the Motorcycle” show! Seriously, who wouldn’t love getting Frank Lloyd Wright’s famed Fifth Avenue landmark set in a permanent winter wonderland? And look at it this way: They wouldn’t be able to do this with the Gugg’s proposed branch for Abu Dhabi.
Amy Sillman Limited Edition prints (Artists Space, 38 Greene Street, third floor, 212-226-3970 x305; $950) Our priciest gift idea is also for a good cause: Purchase of these ink-jet-on-archival-paper prints benefits the nonprofit young artist showcase Artists Space. Each of these humorous looks at the art world (
MoMA Opening, left, and
Turtlenecks) is produced in editions of 17, and are signed and dated by the artist.
