Draft:Helen Ling

MOVE TO "Helen D. Ling" when complete

Helen Dalling Ling (née Dalling; 28 July 1901 – 15 May 1982) was an American-born collector and dealer of Asian art and antiques. She married chemist and physician Tien Gi Ling in 1928 after which they moved to Shanghai, where she opened a "famous" antiques shop. The couple fled to Singapore in 1951 following the Communist takeover of China and she opened another antique shop. After her death, much of her collection was acquired by the Freer Gallery of Art.

Early life and education

Ling was born in Uhrichsville, Ohio on 28 July 1901, although she grew up in Everett, Pennsylvania. She was the daughter of Presbyterian minister Reverend James Dalling. Ling studied at the Bethlehem Business College. She met Tien Gi Ling at a picnic organised by the American Baptist Foreign Mission Society in 1925. She was then working at the Columbia University. As marrying him would result in her losing US citizenship, he suggested that she first visit China when he proposed to her in 1926. After Tien Gi had secured a job for her as an English teacher at the Shanghai University, she left Vancouver aboard the Empress in February 1928, arriving in Shanghai two weeks later. Satisfied, she married him several months later. They moved to Suzhou and then to Wuhan due to Tien Gi's work. They returned to Shanghai in 1930.

Career

In 1931, Ling opened an antique shop named "The Green Dragon" on the second floor of the Central Arcade at the corner of Nanking Road and Szechuan Road in Shanghai. By October 1937, she had been appointed the English-language secretary of the Shanghai Chinese Women's Club, a war relief organisation. She also worked with the Chinese Young Women's Christian Association.

From 1938 to 1946, Ling was able to acquire antiques at a lower cost from refugees arriving in Shanghai. Although she was born in the United States, she was not interned at a concentration camp during the Japanese occupation as her US citizenship had already been revoked, though it was restored following the end of the war. During the occupation, she met Hans Siegel, a "German in the textile business who had a good appreciation of Chinese ceramics", who in turn introduced her to Jacob Emil Melchior, a Dutch businessman and collector of Chinese ceramics. By the 1940s, she had also become an acquantance of antiques dealer Edward T. Chow, with whom she spent two years cataloguing the collection of Melchior, who had died by the time they had finished in 1945. After his death, Ling and Chow both acquired portions of Melchoir's collection. Her family later speculated that she had acquired around one-third of the collection. These were then sent to the United States in 1949. However, apart from the collection, Ling did not acquire much during the occupation as the family was "just scraping by financially".

As a result of the Communist takeover, the Tien Gi left for Hong Kong in 1950 in hopes of moving the family there. She left for Hong Kong aboard the SS General Gordon, the last ship evacuating citizens of the United States in China on 1 May. There, the couple catalogued Chow's collection. While in Hong Kong, Ling appeared on the radio and talked on Chinese art and ceramics. They came to Singapore later that year. In 1952, she was involved in an exhibition of Chinese art which was "so popular" that there had already been plans made by July to hold another one. Ling opened an antique shop named the "Helen D. Ling Shop" at 97 Tanglin Road in May 1953. The shop "was an instant success, much admired and well-known to tourists, Singaporeans and collectors, primarily because of Helen’s knowledge and impeccable good taste in selecting the shop’s inventory". William Holden, Elizabeth Taylor, Martha Graham and Barbara Bush were among the shop's visitors. According to her son, the business supported the family financially before Tien Gi's business took off. Ling would stock the shop with antiques supplied by Chinese dealers who had fled to Hong Kong. She also sold silks designed by Jim Thompson. In 1969, she became the first president of the Southeast Asian Ceramic Society, a position which she held until 1970. From 1971 to 1980, she served as the society's vice-president. In the 1970s, she partnered with Carole and John Wong (???) for her antiques shop. She became known as one of the "three doyennes of the Asian art world", along with Connie Mangskau and Charlotte Horstman. She lectured on Southeast Asian art. She also talked on Chinese art and ceramics on Rediffusion Singapore.

Stephen Zuellig and Gilbert Zuellig in 1950s. The Zuellig's were business associates of Tien Gi.

Collection

In the 1984, Thomas Lawton, the director of the Freer Gallery of Art, visited her home in Bethesda, Maryland, which housed her personal collection. He was "staggered" by the collection. The gallery then acquired around 30 pieces. This included three pieces of ceramics from the Shang dynasty which were over 3,000 years old. The collection was the "largest group of Chinese ceramics ever acquired at one time by the Freer". 32 pieces from Ling's collection, 23 of which were initially from Melchior's collection. The contents of the collection were described as "small in scale, thus especially pleasing to touch and closely examine… a sense of playfulness ran through the collection". The Arthur M. Sackler Gallery also houses items from her collection. In January 1995, 98 pieces from her collection, with the oldest originating in the Eastern Zhou and the newest being from the late Qing dynasty, went on display at the University of Maryland, College Park. John Dorsey of The Baltimore Sun wrote that the exhibition demonstrated that Ling "was not attracted by the largest or flashiest objects" and that she "selected pieces that reflected their periods of creation and were distinguished by their rarity, integrity of form and restrained beauty."

Freer Gallery of Art

Personal life and death

Ling was married to Tien Gi Ling, a ... . Together, they had a son named James, who was born while they were living in Wuhan. The couple owned the Moonlight bungalow in the Cameron Highlands. The couple frequently invited guests, including Mangskau and Thompson, to the property. Thompson disappeared after leaving the bungalow in March 1967.