 ylvain and Dominique Levy are the founders of the DSL Collection, a large collection of Chinese contemporary art that includes paintings, sculpture, installation and video. Beginning in 2005, they began collecting works after a lifetime collecting art and design from around the world and also working in the garment and real estate business. Now, the DSL couple are frequent travelers to China and passionate about this country’s booming art scene. In a lengthy interview in Shanghai with ArtZineChina’s Lynn Zhang, Sylvain Levy talks about his passion, strategy and hopes for the DSL Collection, and his unique idea of building the world’s first virtual museum for Chinese contemporary art.
ArtZineChina: Sylvain Levy, can you tell us a little about your background?
 Sylvain Levy: I started with a garment company, that we sold it in 1987 and since then I've been in real estate.
ArtZineChina: How did you come to collect Chinese contemporary art?
Sylvain Levy: It started in July 2005. Together with my wife Dominique I visited Shanghai. Someone took us to Moganshan Road [the M50 arts district] where we met Lorenz Helbling [founder of ShanghArt Gallery]. He was very nice, introduced us to his gallery and showed us many interesting works. Later, we visited Ding Yi's studio. I was impressed, and on my way back to the hotel I told Dominique that I would actually like to learn more about contemporary Chinese art, as I felt that there was something special about it.
ArtZineChina: You once collected design, right?
Sylvain Levy: We have already built a strong collection, not only of contemporary design. In our home we for example have works of Rauschenberg and Bill Viola, Soulages or Valdez. For two years now, I've been focusing on Chinese art.
 ArtZineChina: What was the first piece you purchased?
Sylvain Levy: The first piece I bought was a painting by Ding Yi. Then I began to discover other artists and I started to do research. Soon I bought works by Zhou Tiehai and Zeng Fanzhi from Lorenz and on my own I bought works by Zhang Huan, on whom I focused. The first six months I was doing my purchases alone. Then I had the chance to meet Paris-based artist Yang Jiechang and his wife Martina Köppel-Yang. Both of them helped to make contacts to many other artists and introduced the young Cantonese art scene to me.
ArtZineChina: Have you visited Yan Pei-Ming's studio?
Sylvain Levy: Yes, I have had dinner with Yan Pei-Ming and Huang Yongping. I am familiar with the Chinese artists in Paris.
ArtZineChina: How do you compare the Chinese artists abroad with those in the mainland?
Sylvain Levy: I think the Paris-based Chinese artists have more international visibility than the mainland artists. Even though acting within the contemporary Western discourse and not primarily considered Chinese, many of the Paris-based artists are nevertheless interested in Chinese tradition and history.  Chinese artist from mainland part from different starting point: their cultural background is clearly defined and their participation in the international art scene was until now mainly considered under the aspects of their cultural origin.
ArtZineChina: Did you decide to start a big collection or did it happen overtime?
Sylvain Levy: One of my principles is to go into depth, no matter what subject I pursue, I want to do it thoroughly. For my design collection I proceeded the same way, and we therefore have one of the strongest design collections in Europe.
ArtZineChina: What are your plans for your Chinese collection?
Sylvain Levy: I will give it to my children. I am not in favour of a foundation. I would like the collection to travel, from Europe to China and elsewhere. Installing it in a fixed place would limit its potential visitors. Besides I think that we are today in a century where things are moving and transgressing all kinds of borders and limits.
ArtZineChina: What kind of artists are you looking for?
Sylvain Levy: I want to sum up the concept of the collection. We are looking for to artists who have a strong interest into and link to the Chinese culture and Chinese tradition, but who are also inscribed in the contemporary discourse and who are in their creation affected by globalization.
 ArtZineChina: So in that sense, you won't buy something very traditional?
Sylvain Levy: It's a collection of contemporary art and thus reflecting the culture of China today. But in China today, people do simultaneously experience tradition and globalization. We would hope that our collection reflects these aspects of contemporary Chinese society. Further, we want a collection representing a large variety of media and artists from different Chinese regions. Our collection comprises painting, video and installation work, multimedia and photography and features artists from different art Chinese scenes like for example Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. I think it is very important to stage regional approaches in a time of cultural globalization entailing unification and leveling of marginal and regional phenomena. We therefore also financially support a non-profit art space in Guangzhou, Chen Tong’s “Libreria Borges Center for Contemporary Art”. Another important aspect of the collection is that it is limited to a fixed number of works, about 120 works.
ArtZineChina: If you're limited to 120 works, this means whenever you have 121 pieces you'll have to sell or exchange one?
Sylvain Levy: Yes. I believe, what is important is the possibility to regenerate and reorganize the collection with time. To maintain a coherent collection one is obliged to consider every work and every artist. Is the work still in accordance with your way of thinking? Is the artist still progressing? The individual works should further communicate with each other. It's a comprehensive collection. A collection is a work in progress. So we have to constantly rethink and re-evaluate it.
ArtZineChina: Why 120?
Sylvain Levy: The number doesn't really matter. It is just to set a limit. I think of the collection as a tree: if you cut the branches, the trunk becomes more solid. We limit the collection, but we have a comprehensive body of a large variety of works, comprising works from artists so different in their artistic approach like for example Zhang Huan and Yang Jiechang. Further we united small collections of works by one artist.
ArtZineChina: Do you have favorites?
Sylvain Levy: I have stories. I know how I bought it, why I bought it. You know, behind every work there's a small story. And that is important to me. Every work means something to me personally. That's why I'm very keen to meet every artist represented in the collection. I am curious to meet the human being behind the artist. I want to learn more about his feelings, considerations and projects. I think I've told you the story I experienced with Zhang Huan. I asked his wife, “Do you have something really crazy, really outrageous?” and she said, “Yes, we do.” So DSL bought a large installation work by him, a figure seated in a huge chair, a work related to one of his performances. I also like Lin Yilin, I bought one of his first installations made from traditional  Chinese bricks. Then I acquired a crazy interactive multimedia installation by Cheng Shulea, a Taiwanese artists based in New York and Paris. She’s working on an internet project. In 1985, she was the first to make an internet related work at the Guggenheim Museum.
ArtZineChina: I think she once came to Shanghai for the MOCA.
Sylvain Levy: I also have works by Du Zhenjun who is working with interactive multimedia installations, too. I acquired a large piece with 12 m diameter that is now on show in Beijing and had been exhibited in Shanghai three months ago. But I started with paintings by Ding Yi, later Zheng Fanzhi, Little Liu Wei and Chen Wenbo, or again Yang Jiechang and water colors by Gu Dexin.
ArtZineChina: What do you like right now?
Sylvain Levy: Right now I love big installation works, like for example from Xu Tan and Cao Fei.
ArtZineChina: How did the web site come about?
Sylvain Levy: Today in the 21st century, the concept of sharing is of increasing significance: there are blogs, “youtube”, “my space”, etc. Formerly, private collections were seldom made accessible to a larger public, the works were put away into storage, or if donated to a museum, they were integrated into a large body of artworks and only rarely exhibited. But I believe that art is meant to be seen. The internet is the most powerful tool of communication and sharing today. You can visualize the art works on the internet, of course for three-dimensional works this more complex and difficult than for example  for video works. And, for sure, the representation in the virtual space has a different quality than experiencing the physical art work in an exhibition. It's not the same experience but both experiences are complimentary. One can enjoy art in a museum and one can also enjoy it in the internet. Further the internet and also our web-site is a tool of research that allows understanding the creation of an art work and the artist’s approach from different angles. I believe, what is important, is to give visibility to art and the artists, in particular to those who are not necessarily the darlings of the auction market. By featuring their work in the internet and providing information, we give them visibility. We also promote the collection as such through ads in art magazines. Further, we use movie trailers, and all is done in English and Chinese. We have an important buzz policy.
ArtZineChina: Where do you do that?
Sylvain Levy: We have done an ad on “You tube”.
ArtZineChina: But you don't wan t to sell to them? You want to just communicate?
Sylvain Levy: Yes, the artists are very satisfied with this kind of policy. We're communicating and by doing this, a large public learns to appreciate artists and art works different from those constantly seen in auctions and art fairs.
We devote a lot of time to the web site. We translate everything, and have blogs and forums. We are also working with curators and the artists who provide texts and other documents on their work. We basically have two curators writing for us, so that there is a short introduction to every work in the collection. We want the web site to become a tool.
ArtZineChina: Has collecting become harder?
Sylvain Levy: Yes, definitely, because it has become more expensive.
ArtZineChina: People in south Asia don't like to buy installations.
Sylvain Levy: Well, I guess this will be changing. 80% of the art work featured in exhibitions nowadays are installation and video and photos. But of course, it is hard to install.
ArtZineChina: How much research do you do?
Sylvain Levy: A lot. I try to assemble information from different angles. I check Google, and I ask specialists and gallery people, like Lorenz Helbling, David Chan, and Zhang Wei. In the end, we make the decision. But we always investigate.
ArtZineChina: Do you have any concerns about the development of the artists in China?
Sylvain Levy: For me, one problem now and also for the future with some of the Chinese artists is, that they are rather producers than artists. Some studios are like  painting factories.
ArtZineChina: Do you always go to see the artists if you purchase a work?
Sylvain Levy: Not always. But I always try to meet them. In the beginning, I just wanted to make a web site for myself. Then my wife Dominique said: "You should make it accessible to everyone." After having become aware that there is a real lack of information, we launched the project of the website and the virtual museum. We plan to create rooms for temporary exhibitions and we'll ask curators to make exhibition there. We will also change the rooms featuring our collection every few months.
Concerning the public we want to reach, there are four different levels of people. First, we want to reach art students. We put ads in publications at art schools. Second, we want to reach the artists. In November, when we first launched the video trailer, we sent 400 emails to Chinese artists and now we contact also Western artists. Third, we aim to reach curators and museum directors; and fourth, we want to reach magazines, journalists and editors, hoping that they recommend the web site.
BELOW IS THE MISSION STATEMENT OF THE DSL COLLECTION:
The concepts of the collection
1) The collection is based on artists who are deeply rooted in their traditions, but also part of contemporary discourse and concerned by and involved in globalization.
 2) The collection is an open and comprehensive collection.
It comprises works of the early Chinese avant-garde, as well as recent contemporary works, further works stemming from different regions in China and being executed in different media.
We show no particular preponderance for one medium; we collect painting, sculpture, installation, photography, videos, interactive multi-media works and internet art.
3) The collection pays special attention to regional art scenes,
For example a special attention is devoted to the Cantonese art scene with works from the Big Tail Elephant Working Group, the Yangjiang Group and Zheng Guougu, or again Yang Jiechang, Yang Yong, Cao Fei and Chen Tong. Each artist or group is represented with works from different periods.
4) The collection is limited to 120 works.
Thus it imposes on it a condition that demands constant reconsideration and regeneration.
We revisit the collection every year to maintain and enhance excellence, intensity, and actuality always having in mind the coherence of the collection. The idea is not to sum up works but to try to always ameliorate to create an homogenous collection with works communicating one with another.
5) The collection should be “a nomad collection”
It should not solely be based in one city; a collection that one day could be shown in a travelling – nomad – museum. To day, the works are physically in China and in Europe.
6) Showing the collection in museums is a top priority
 7) The collection gives as much visibility as possible to its artists
It is important to show those facets of contemporary Chinese art that are most vigorous, innovative and acute. These facets are however rarely exhibited by the auction houses and other large-scale sales exhibitions.
To reach this goal we use:
- Traditional advertising like ads inserted in magazines like Yishu, Journal for Contemporary Chinese Art (Vancouver) or Visual Productions (Shanghai).
- An important buzz policy to make the collection known among a steadily growing audience.
- Chinese and English trailers like movies trailers are put on websites like YouTube
- A funding policy to non profitable Art Space like Libreria Borges of Chen Tong in Canton
- The internet and thus we create the website www.dslcollection.org
The website: dslcollection.org
1) The website is a crucial part of the collection
Sharing through the internet has become an important model of communication and information in our society.
A lot of energy and investment is devoted to the website. Two persons are working full time in order to translate the website into Chinese for the Chinese audience which is a priority and to make usable all tools, like engine research machines, blogs, and forums.
We send more than 10 000 emails to artists, museums, curators, Art schools and magazines all over the world to announce the launching of our virtual museum. Today we have more than 400 visits on the website per day and this number is increasing day after day.
 2) The internet proposes another layer of experience to the visitor
The virtual “dematerialization” of art here is conceived as being complementary to a mere a physical, tactile experience of the art works.
3) The website is an efficient tool of information
On the website we provide various documents, such as different views of an art work, portraits of the artists, as well as articles written by curators or the artists themselves.
4) We will keep permanently improving the website
We would like to use more and more 3D animations and videos. This year we will open new rooms where curators will be asked to organize temporary virtual exhibitions.
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