Virtual Visionary

It’s no wonder Shanyan Koder has forged an enviable reputation as a trusted adviser to serious art collectors and institutions—after all, she is the daughter of renowned collector Canning Fok. Now the creative London-based entrepreneur is shaking up the art market with a digital revolution. She talks to Christina Ko

In the living room of Shanyan Koder’s London home sits a large, iridescent canvas by Damien Hirst called Eden. “It’s the only butterfly work by Damien— and he’s done a lot—that has every single butterfly from his entire series within a single work,” says the Hong Kong-born entrepreneur, an avid art collector. “It’s pretty incredible.” Her entire personal collection is equally incredible and includes all you’d expect and more, from a Tracey Emin neon to a Degas pastel on paper, from an Antony Gormley figure to a couple of Chris Ofili paintings and photographs by Candida Höfer. It’s a mix of emerging and established, modern and contemporary, Eastern and Western pieces, many of which she lives with and all of which are the result of emotion-driven purchases.

“Be it that I love it or it makes me sad, I have to have a reaction,” says the daughter of Canning Fok (whose role as Li Ka-shing’s right-hand man gave him the wherewithal to build his own extensive art collection and inspire his daughter). “Emotionally, spiritually, psychologically—I might hate it, it might make me angry but I have to react to it, rather than understanding the concept or thinking it’s an investable piece of art.” The importance of her emotional reactions was one of the things she came to understand as a little girl accompanying her mother and father to auctions to bid on Renoirs and Picassos for their collection of Impressionist masters.