On Oct 3, 9:27 pm, CL <flot...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> Medgya wrote:
> > So I wonder if anyone has experience shipping religious art work (in
> > this case a consecrated Buddhist statue about 70cm tall) within Japan.
> > We called up trusty Yamato and were told that, while their regular
> > service can't do it (something about liabilities), they have a special
> > department that does handle such things. Does anyone know of other
> > options? We'll try calling some of the local museums and temples
> > later, but I just thought I'd ask here, too.
>
> > Thanks!
>
> The problem with shipping religious art, particularly consecrated
> statues ... and I only know about this because I know one of the
> restorers in Nara who has worked at Kofuku-ji, Horyu-ji, and Todai-ji
> ... is the incredible amount of insurance a shipping company is required
> to have in order to be licensed to ship rare art ... the amount of
> specialized training and specialized packing that their staff have to
> learn ... and then the shipper (you) has to lay on their own insurance
> on top of that.  The premium will depend on who you have do the
> shipping.  The better known, the lower the premium.  The big companies
> like Yamato, Art 123, and Nittsu are rumored to do shipments for small,
> needy temples for almost their cost, taking the profit out of the big
> museums and the government.

Thanks for that information! Very helpful! In this case the statue
belongs to a very small Buddhist practice group in Tokyo. Really just
a bunch of individuals, and the idea was to ship it to the person who
would be applying gold leaf, painting the eyes, etc, as requested by
the monk who consecrated it, but who is rather far away. The
alternative is just to wait until he has opportunities to visit Tokyo,
doing the work bit by bit. So the tradeoff is a matter of airline
tickets and Tokyo hotels versus shipping.

It sounds like the best move will be to call up those three large
companies you mentioned and see if they can just provide estimates.
Fortunately the statue is not zillion-yen not museum art, but more of
a "working" image, meant for practice and inspiration. Very
interesting that the big three would do the work for cost to small
temples. It kind makes my day, in fact, or what's left of it!