Antique Japanese dolls are Mission Valley man's unique avocation

Japanese doll dealer Alan Pate displays one of his Ningyo dolls: at his home in St. Ignatius last week. "Anybody who has a Japanese doll question comes to me now," Pate says. "I've found myself alne in this field, not only in America, but in Japan as well."
KURT WILSON/Missoulian

By JOE NICKELL of the Missoulian

ST. IGNATIUS - Alan Pate laughs when he recalls his first visit to a meeting of the St. Ignatius Chamber of Commerce. As the meeting began, businesspeople around the table explained their line of business and fielded questions. Finally, Pate's turn to speak came.

"I said that I deal in antique Japanese dolls from the 18th and 19th century," Pate recalls. "The response was total silence. There were no questions, not a word really. I think people assumed I was some lunatic who would be in Montana for one winter and then be gone."

As dealership specialties go, there are few more obscure than the one that has held Pate's fascination - and paid his bills - for the past dozen years. As far as he knows, he is the only person in either America or Japan who deals specifically and exclusively in the traditional dolls known as Ningyo. In fact, in Japan, he is known as "the Doll Guy," and has become a sought-after expert on Ningyo in the very country where these dolls were once a hallowed cultural tradition.

"Anybody who has a Japanese doll question comes to me now," says Pate. "I've found myself alone in this field, not only in America but in Japan as well."

Though Pate uses the word "doll" to refer to the figures he collects, he is quick to point out the shortcomings of the word in describing the cultural meaning or artistry of Ningyo.

Made by traditional craftsmen dating back as far as 2500 B.C., Ningyo come in many forms, including puppets, military figures, mechanical dolls, and so on. Moreover, they have specific meaning that goes far beyond that of American-style dolls.

"We Americans simply don't have a word for a talismanic figure that protects the family and provides auspicious greetings," says Pate. "That would be a very long acronym, so we use the word doll."

For centuries, Ningyo were weighted with mystical, personal meaning for most Japanese: They were believed to be inhabited, literally, by spirits. That all began to change when Japan opened itself to outsiders during the 20th century, and began to adopt Western ideas regarding art and dolls.

"The Japanese inherited a lot of the biases of Western art: what is high art, low art, folk art and so on," explains Pate. "We here in America think of dolls as Barbie, Ken, Raggedy Ann - things that don't have art value because they're associated with children. In Japan, Ningyo have been very important historically until the past century."

Though Ningyo still exist all over Japan, much of their cultural significance has been lost. That, in a nutshell, is why Pate has found himself in recent years at the center of a revival of interest in Ningyo among art collectors, museums and academics.

Pate now lectures and consults with art professionals on the topic of Ningyo. In fact, after speaking in Missoula Thursday night, he leaves Montana to give a lecture in London. He has spoken at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, at the San Francisco Asian Art Museum, and at universities and other institutions across the country.

He has even published two books on the subject: "Ningyo: The Art of the Japanese Doll," and "Japanese Dolls: the Fascinating World of Ningyo."

To him, the allure of these dolls isn't just their physical traits, evocative and beautiful as they are. Instead, Pate finds himself drawn to something deeper.

"They provide a window into practically every single aspect of Japanese culture and tradition," says Pate. "Name a category, and the degrees of separation between that and a Ningyo form are usually not many. I can show examples of how Ningyo address gender issues, political issues, literature, textiles, fashion, sexual mores, acupuncture - you name it. Being a history buff, these offer insights into the culture that you can't get from history books."

So that's why Alan Pate lives in a house full of antique dolls.

But why in Montana?

"The dolls don't relate to Montana at all," he says with a laugh. "I'm not really reliant on local clients to buy the dolls at all."

Before he moved to Montana, Pate owned a gallery in La Jolla, Calif., where he sold the Ningyo that he collected on frequent trips to Japan. After several years living there, he realized that his clientele almost never came to the gallery.

"They were scattered all over the place and mostly dealt with me through the mail; I sent photos and we negotiated that way," says Pate. "It dawned on me that if no one came to my gallery in La Jolla, why was I in La Jolla? Some friends of mine and I had been coming to hike in the Absaroka Mountains for years, and it just occurred to me that I could just as easily do this here as anywhere else."

Nowadays, most of his sales take place through his Web site, antiquejapanesedolls.com.

"It's been a really great thing and I feel really fortunate to be able to do this here," adds Pate, sitting on the deck of his house under a brilliant blue sky, with the Mission Mountains at his back. "I completely realize that I'm a really big fish in a really, really tiny pond. Who knew that this great tradition even exists in Japan, let alone that someone in Montana could make a living dealing in it?"

Reporter Joe Nickell can be reached at (406)523-5358, or via email: jnickell@missoulian.com