The Standard, May 30, 2005
Chinese oil masterpiece goes for a record $18m
Sylvia Hui

The most expensive Chinese oil painting ever sold fetched HK$18 million at an auction of modern and contemporary Chinese paintings.

On the first day of Christie's four-day spring auctions Sunday, modern master Zhao Wuji's largest triptych, Juin-Octobre 85, broke the world record price for Chinese oil paintings, going under the hammer within the estimated range of HK$16 to HK$20 million. At 10 meters long, the work is also the world's largest Chinese oil painting.

Chairman of Christie's Australia and auctioneer Roger McIlroy, who described the auction as one of the best he has seen in his 30-year career, said Zhao's creation went to an Asian private collector who phoned in bids. The previous world record - HK$7.5 million - was also for a Zhao work.

Other lots did equally well, with some selling at 10 times the lowest estimate, said McIlroy.

The auction is being held in the Convention and Exhibition Centre in Wan Chai for the first time. It is a move that signals rapid market expansion and increasing demand for Chinese art, especially modern Chinese oils, according to Christie's 20th-century Chinese art specialist Eric Chang.

``The Asian art market is the world's focus now,'' he said, citing the phenomenal growth of Christie's sale of Chinese oil paintings from last season's HK$96 million to an expected HK$200 million this spring.

He attributed the rocketing prices to the traditional under-estimation of Chinese oils, and the rise in Chinese buying power in recent years.

More than 400 people squeezed into the auction hall.

http://www.thestandard.com.hk/stdn/std/Metro/GE30Ak10.html

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Sunday Times, May 22, 2005
China’s new rich outbid world to reclaim treasures
Tom Pattinson

WEALTHY Chinese investors who have rediscovered a taste for national culture and history are buying back huge amounts of their country’s antique art, driving up prices at auctions across the world.

Chinese art lovers and dealers are regularly outbidding European and American buyers for porcelain and paintings. Most popular are works from the Ming (1368-1644), and Qing (1644-1911) dynasties, the prices of which have doubled in two years.

“We used to go to auctions in Europe and we would be practically the only person there — now there are 10 Chinese,” said Daniel Eskenazi, London’s biggest dealer in antique Chinese art. “A few years ago it was a rarity to have a piece go for £1m, but now it is quite common.”

The growing Chinese presence on the world art market is a product of the country’s dramatic economic transformation. During the rule of Mao Tse-tung, which ended in 1976, landowners, artists and aristocrats were imprisoned or forced to give up all their possessions, including works of art.

Since economic reform started in the early 1980s, however, a new class of entrepreneurs has emerged with a desire to invest in art.

“Fifteen to 20 years ago no Chinese would touch the stuff. It all left the country,” said Henry Howard-Sneyd, Sotheby’s managing director for China, Southeast Asia and Australasia. “Now they are beginning to try to buy it back.”

Almost all Chinese articles sold at auction in the past six months have changed hands at well over estimated prices.

At Sotheby’s in London last November, an 18th-century painting expected to fetch £8,000-£12,000 was bought by a Chinese collector for more than £300,000. Three weeks ago at a Sotheby’s auction in Hong Kong a painted scroll, estimated at £40,000, was sold for £620,000.

The Chinese collectors are also looking to make a profit. “The new rich, who are uneasy investing in the stock market, invest in art,” said William Chak, one of the biggest buyers of Chinese art.

China’s government and its museums are also commissioning experts such as Chak, who is based in Hong Kong, to buy back important pieces.

Eskanazi, who spent a record £3m on a Qing vase this month at a Hong Kong auction, said the appeal of Chinese art was its diversity.

“It is part of 5,000 years of uninterrupted history,” he said. “Unlike Greece or Egypt, which had a golden period, China never stopped. And because of that there is something for everybody.”

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2089-1622186,00.html

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The Standard, Weekend: May 21-22, 2005
Picture perfect
Mark Clifford

[image] Above: Shelter in the Valley by Lang Jingshan. Below: Hermitage, by the same artist

A big bout of China fever, a world awash in money and a new generation of collectors looking to get into Chinese art: It all added up to very impressive results for Sotheby's recent auction of Chinese contemporary art in Hong Kong.

The auction, one of five held by Sotheby's over three days, was notable for what it said about the willingness of collectors to bid up previously inexpensive or even obscure works as well as to confirm values for more established artists. From pop art to photography to oils, most lots handily beat their pre-sale estimates.

The auction kicked off with photography and that began the sizzling bidding. Photographs are a good place for collectors to get into the market. They often don't take any special knowledge to appreciate, they look good on the wall and they are affordable. Or at least they were.

Buyers of most of the dozen lots of photographs drove prices above estimates. The fact that most of these photos had increased in price more than tenfold in a few years didn't seem to matter.

Neither did the fact that some experts argue that some photos are little more than records of performance art rather than serious photography. None of this, nor the idea that multiple editions of the same print might exist , deterred bidders.

Zhang Huan's 12 Square Meters fetched double its estimate, bringing in HK$204,000. (Sale prices include a buyer's premium of 20 percent on the first HK$1.5 million and 12 percent after that; auction estimates exclude the premium.)

The picture depicts Zhang, who had anointed his body with honey and what the catalogue describes as "visceral liquid from fish'' sitting naked in a public toilet, his body covered with flies.

The work of pioneering photographer Lang Jingshan (1892-1995) is more traditional but no less pricey: a pair of his prints brought in HK$252,000, quadruple the estimate. Lang's composite photographs, assembled from different negatives, echo Chinese landscape paintings. The photos are evocative, approachable, well-known and carry an impeccable provenance, coming from the collection of one of Lang's friends and patrons.

If photo prices surprised on the upside, the record for paintings was strong but not quite not as impressive, given the higher prices and greater selection.

[image] Above: Chaos by Gu Wenda; Below: Andy Warhol by Wang Guangyi.

There were some notable successes. The abstract oils of Paris-based painter Zao Wou-ki (Zhao Wuji) have rocketed in value in the past decade as a new generation of Chinese collectors adopted him.

Zao is one of the few Chinese artists who is successful both internationally - he is something of an icon in France - and in his home country. His work 11.1.1959 commanded HK$5.72 million at the auction. Another piece sold right in the middle of the estimated range, bringing in HK$900,000, with buyer's premium. A modest ink drawing comfortably beat estimates with its HK$324,000 price.

But three of Zao's pieces, including a striking abstract oil with a HK$2 million-HK$3 million estimate, simply didn't sell. That may have reflected overly ambitious estimates by owners, but it could augur poorly for an upcoming auction. Rival Christie's May 29 Chinese & Asian contemporary art auction will feature 12 Zao paintings for sale.

At Sotheby's, older masters also showed surprising strength.

Wu Guanzhong, born into a peasant family in 1919, is emerging as an increasingly popular painter among collectors. Working in oils, Wu synthesizes Western and Eastern styles. He studied in Paris during the 1940s but draws heavily on Chinese masters as well.

After Zao Wuji, the HK$3.7 million that Wu's Banyan Tree in Xishuangbanna brought was the highest price of the auction. Wu's four lots, including work from Paris, brought in almost HK$12 million altogether.

The Parisian work, painted on a trip sponsored by the Seibu department store, could be seen as yet another cliched look at the former artist's district of Montmartre. But the anonymous buyer or buyers of the paintings were not deterred.

Taiwan's Ju Ming saw a solid re-ception for his popular bronze tai chi sculptures. The three lots sold brought HK$240,000 to $780,000 each.

[image] No 145 by Zhu Dequin

Xu Bing, recipient of a prestigious MacArthur Foundation grant in the United States and well-known for his plays on Chinese calligraphic tradition, saw both his works sold at more than double the estimate.

Gu Wenda, also known for his inventive working with calligraphic tradition, brought several times the estimate.

In both cases, however, Sotheby's estimates were on the low side and the final prices were in line with what the artists are commanding in New York and London.

In all, the sale brought a very respectable HK$41.1 million with 63 of 72 lots sold. That was nearly double the HK$22 million realized in Sotheby's first auction of contemporary Chinese art, held last autumn and featuring 50 lots.

The real test of the market will be the Christie's auction at the end of the month. That sale will have a staggering 397 lots, more than quintuple the size of Sotheby's sale.

Besides the inability of Zao to sell half of his offerings at Sotheby's, buyers will also be interested to see how Korean art fares in the upcoming auction, given the weak response that the eight Korean lots at Sotheby's met.

Minor disappointments aside, the sale was part of a set of very strong early May sales for Sotheby's in Hong Kong. The three-day series of auctions, whose themes included watches, Chinese ceramics, jade, jewels and classical Chinese paintings, brought in a total of HK$634.3 million, a record for Sotheby's in Hong Kong. Most of the buyers were Chinese, largely from Hong Kong, Taiwan and Indonesia. Mainland bidders were more active than in the past.

http://www.thestandard.com.hk/stdn/std/Weekend/GE21Jp05.html

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www.chinaview.cn 2005-05-18
Art investment scene depicts perfect opportunity

BEIJING, May 18 -- The price of contemporary Chinese art is rising, painting an uplifting landscape of investment opportunities.

When Christie's opens its Hong Kong auction house later this month, it will look to Chinese painters to break price records.

Paintings by Shanghai-born Zao Wou-ki (aka Zhao Wuji) and Lin Fengmian - "a pioneer of Chinese modern art" - are expected to fetch millions of yuan and trigger a further rise in prices fetched by China's modern artists.

Lin's works have already fetched upwards of 3 million yuan (US$362,700), but Eric Chan, vice-president and 20th Century Chinese art specialist at Christie's said the sprawling, powerful Juin-Octobre 1985 (sic) - a 10-metre wide oil on canvass - could fetch even more.

"The prices right now are very good but, for collectors, they are also very good," said Chan last week in Shanghai during a public viewing for the May 29 auction that will be held in Hong Kong.

Modern artworks by Chinese artists have been traditionally cheaper than works by western artists but the gap is starting to close. Lin and Zao, both born in the early 1900s, are classic examples.

Prices for their works are rising.

"They are getting close. How close? I don't know."

At the same time, buyers from the Chinese mainland are becoming as important as those from Hong Kong and Taiwan. They are spending more money - even if it is mostly on traditional art like calligraphies.

Taiwan and Hong Kong buyers contributed about one third each of the volume of business of Chinese paintings and calligraphies at Christie's spring and autumn auctions last year. At the same time, the percentage shared by Chinese mainland buyers keeps rising.

And so do the sums they spend.

Yang Xiu, a Nanjing real estate developer in Nanjing, paid the highest price for a single Chinese art lot in the world market last June at the spring auction of Hanhai Auction Co Ltd in Beijing. He paid 69.3 million yuan (US$8.35 million) for an album of landscapes by Shanghai-born artist Lu Yanshao (1909-93).

At the same auction a record price was set for a modern Chinese ink painting. A Zhejiang businessman paid 18.7 million yuan (US$2.25 million) for a Fu Baoshi (1904-65) painting.

The collective efforts of buyers from Shanghai and neighbouring Zhejiang and Jiangsu provinces have boosted interest in artists from East China. The growing interest - and willingness to spend money - has naturally led to rising prices for the works of some artists

For example, prices for works by Wu Guanzhong, from Wuxi, arguably the most sought after of contemporary Chinese artist, have more than doubled in the past six months.

"Collectors in East China have triggered the national fever for Wu's art," said Liu Shangyong, vice-manager-general of the Rongbao Auction House, an affiliate of the 300-year-old art dealer Rongbaozhai and one of the five major art auctioneers in Beijing. "Now everyone finds his landscapes of watertowns, especially those he created in the 1970s and 1980s, beautiful and interesting."

"However, East China's collectors do not appreciate Wu's more abstract art created in the last decade. They show no interest in the works of Chinese vanguard artists Xu Bing and Cai Guoqiang, which are sought after in New York," he added.

Other types of art are also attracting more buyers.

"The number of major ceramic buyers in Shanghai and its neighbouring areas almost equals that in Beijing," said Ben Kong, Christie's representative in Beijing.

"Actually some of the biggest buyers of Chinese ceramics live in the small city of Cixi, in Zhejiang Province," he added.

What's more, Chinese people - at least those with the means to seriously collect or invest in art - are flying around the world to buy Chinese paintings and calligraphies. Often average prices in Hong Kong and in the Chinese mainland exceed prices in New York or London, said Kong.

But if buying modern Chinese art - produced earlier last century - is by most accounts a risk-free proposition, the same cannot necessarily be said of contemporary art.

"Modern art is more stable. Contemporary art is more about the kind of artist you select," said Christie's Chan.

Often, contemporary art tends to reflect ideas more than it reflects skill in the fine arts.

Works that can do both, he said, may retain or appreciate in value.

"I think certain artists, the young artists, they think about culture," he said. "I think people should pay attention."

"Buyers don't appreciate art, they buy it as an investment," he said. Still, "if they want to invest in art, they should think more deeply."

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2005-05/18/content_2968866.htm

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China Daily 05/18/2005
Shanghai interest in arts grows
By Luo Man and Wang Shanshan (China Daily)

SHANGHAI: In a city more associated with the colour of money than the colours on a canvas, a growing interest in the arts is making waves.

Interest in art collecting is growing in Shanghai and neighbouring Jiangsu and Zhejiang provinces, said Li Lei, vice-president of the Shanghai Institute of Oil Painting and Sculptures and one of the organizers of "Art Shanghai," which begins today.

The four-day fair includes more than 6,000 works by Western artists and some Chinese contemporary painters, and will cater to the growing number of collectors with a taste for the lesser known works of Western masters and who may be willing to pay up to 1 million yuan (US$120,000) for them.

This growing pool of customers has not gone unnoticed overseas. "Art Shanghai" has attracted more than 100 galleries and a similar number of artists from 11 countries.

Organizers say the event, which was held for the first time in 2003, is one of the largest art fairs in the country and the largest in Shanghai.

However, in this financial hub, much like the rest of China, modern and contemporary Western art is an acquired taste.

When Christie's held its first pre-auction public viewing in Shanghai in 1993, the first on the Chinese mainland, it had on display impressionist works from European collections alongside Chinese art, said Ben Kong, Christie's Beijing representative.

In subsequent viewings, the Western works were conspicuously absent. That changed at the turn of the century. In 2000, a Shanghai-based real estate development company paid a French gallery US$1 million for a sculpture by Rodin.

Even more telling is the fact that purchases of that kind no longer make headlines.

"In the past five years mainland collectors of Western art have matured as they learnt more about Western art history and the ups and downs at New York and London art markets," Li said.

Auction houses are becoming busier and busier. The city's two largest auctioneers, namely Duoyunxuan Auction Co Ltd and Chongyuan Auction Co Ltd, have seen annual growth of more than 50 per cent in the past five years.

The number of art fairs has also risen.There are more than 400 galleries in Shanghai which is playing a leading role in the growing interest in Western art.

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/english/doc/2005-05/18/content_443326.htm

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(Art-Eastasia list)

http://www.chinaresource.org
http://www.fluktor.de

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