IHT, JULY 30, 2005
Disregarded yesterday; pricey Chinese art today
By Souren Melikian International Herald Tribune

LONDON Never believe the last word has been said in the art market, not
even when a 14th-century porcelain vase from China sells for £15.66
million, as was the case July 12 at Christie's.

To China watchers, a very minor sale of Chinese works of art held July
15 at Christie's South Kensington spelled out far bigger news for the
future. Suddenly porcelain vases of the most banal kind, many of them of
such recent date that only flea-market dealers would have bothered to go
after them three or four years ago, were fought over as if there was no
tomorrow. Estimates were often multiplied three or four times. Almost
invariably the winners were Chinese bidders from the mainland, or Hong
Kong dealers known to do a lot of business with mainland clients.

What they bought implied the recent appearance of mainland buyers with
limited means and even more limited knowledge of the art, but eager to
surround themselves with the tokens of old China.

This became apparent from the very beginning. Interestingly, the
enthusiastic bidders did not grab just anything that came up. They
allowed the first lot a rather pretty blue and white Ming bowl decorated
with birds arranged in circular motifs to remain unsold and they
likewise ignored the pleasing Kangxi bowl that came next. Painted with
bamboo and a blossoming peach tree, the Kangxi bowl went for a song -
£720, or about $1,257.

But when presented with another very ordinary Ming bowl, painted with
Shoulao riding on the back of a crane flying toward the Seven Immortals,
the mainland bidders became agitated. The Ming bowl brought £2,400,
double the estimate.

Minutes later, a pair of late 17th century bowls even more closely
evocative of old China came up. Four tableaux in typical Kangxi style
with scholars in a garden were separated by vertical bands of
calligraphy on the sides. Competition between Chinese bidders sent the
pair climbing to £4,560.

Auction fever quickly rose. When came the turn of a Kangxi brush pot
with courtly scenes, the Chinese bidders became positively excited.
Brush pots are part of the obligatory paraphernalia of anyone keen to
suggest scholarly pursuits. The cylindrical vessel ended up at £11,400,
triple the high estimate.

This led up to the first truly astonishing outburst. A large famille
rose baluster vase, estimated by Christie's South Kensington to be worth
£4,000 to £6,000, shot up to £81,600. Sages and children gazing at a
crane flying toward a temple emerging from water are painted on the
sides. Stylized blossoms in acid yellow and green stand out on the
intensely pink ground of the neck. The garishness of the vessel probably
accounts for Christie's South Kensington giving it a 19th-century date
despite a Qianlong seal mark that would suggest the years 1735-1796.
Several London dealers, however, were convinced of its authenticity, and
so were leading Chinese professionals. A few years ago they might all
have disregarded the vase. Not any more.

William Chak, the renowned Hong Kong dealer who enjoys an established
mainland clientele, fought hard but eventually allowed another renowned
dealer, Stewart Marchant, the son and partner of Richard Marchant of
London, to carry the trophy - the Marchants too have excellent contacts
on the mainland.

How extensive the impact of the new mainland constituency for the most
modest wares has become was shown by a whole series of very different
pieces.

A vase covered from top to bottom with polychrome flowers of a
nondescript style came next. Inside, a cylindrical shaft painted with
birds on prunus branches made it the kind of curio beloved by tourists
of the Edwardian era. A Qianlong seal mark had been supplied by its
20th-century maker, in an attempt to give the vase a more respectable
look. Until recently, it would have been hard to sell, with a £1,500 to
£2,000 estimate plus the 20 percent sale charge. On July 15, a Chinese
bidder ran it up to an astonishing £13,200.

Other wares, dismissed as junk two decades ago, are now catalogued with
the care devoted to great art.

If an expert writing an entry in the 1980s had mentioned a Hongxian seal
mark on the underside of a pair of vases, this would have been
understood as an expression of tongue-in-cheek humor. The mark was used
from 1915 to 1916, and 20th-century porcelain attempting to recapture
the graces of the Qianlong age was considered worthless.

On July 15 at Christie's South Kensington, no trace of such contempt
could be detected. A pair of Hongxian-marked vases decorated with birds
amid blossoms exceeded their estimate at £4,560, and another, painted
with boys frolicking in a garden, brought £6,000. The ghost of old
China, if not its most faithful image, did the trick. Later in the sale,
a Hongxian vase painted with a landscape in 18th-century style
quadrupled its estimate and again made £6,000.

There was another typical specimen of a category that few dealers would
have looked at sympathetically a short while ago. The pair of jars
retaining their covers (which is rare) was painted with green dragons
chasing pearls. Their Daoguang mark dated them to the years 1820 to
1850, explaining the mechanical rendition of the dragons, which verge on
caricature. One cover had a crack. Christie's South Kensington's £4,000
to £6,000 estimate seemed generous. Not to the Chinese, who sent the
pair sailing to £28,800. The five-clawed dragons are imperial symbols,
and the Daoguang mark further stresses the imperial character of the
pieces. For the new constituency, that will do fine.

Most astonishing of all was the success of a jade "rhyton," or pouring
vessel, wrought in a style that tries to suggest the early Warring
States period, some time around the sixth or fifth century B.C. Giuseppe
Eskenazi, the world's leader in early Chinese art, sees it as a spoof of
recent make. A similar opinion was voiced by four other professionals. A
telephone bidder, outdoing a Chinese mainland leader, presumably took a
more optimistic view. The jade vessel soared to £78,000, 10 times the
estimate.

This massive promotion of what cynics might call the underworld of
Chinese art is already having a rebound effect on the upper layers of
the market. A pair of celadon bowls of the Yongzheng period (1722-1735)
with the corresponding imperial mark went up to £84,000, tripling
Christie's forecast. A crack from head to foot affects one of the two
bowls. The price, effectively paid for one bowl, is huge. Yet the buyer
was Chak, a top-level professional.

Later, Chak tried to buy a pair of blue and white vases of the Jiaqing
period (1796-1820) decorated in a revivalist style. But even he thought
it too expensive as it reached £90,000, five times the estimate,
anonymously paid over the telephone. In March at the New York Asian Art
Fair, Marchant sold a similar vase of the Qianlong period for only £25,000.

In the short term, the rise of the mainland in the Chinese art market is
a boon for Western dealers with the right contacts. Stewart Marchant
said the auction week was excellent for business. A Qianlong wall vase
made for the palace and dated 1750, for which the asking price on the
Marchant stand was $135,000, or £75,000, at the New York Asian Art Fair
in March, found no taker then. This month it went to a Shanghai client.

In the longer term, Western dealers will find it increasingly difficult
to compete. Already, the leading Chinese dealers are outbidding them on
later objects. Chak went up to £16,800 for a bowl-shaped circular box of
the 19th century, painted in grisaille on yellow ground with a
five-clawed dragon inside a circular frame surrounded by blossoming trees.

The July 15 sale and its fallout on the London trade suggest that the
Chinese may come to dominate the market for their own art from top to
bottom within the next few years. It tells us a lot more than the prices
of a few porcelain pots. That "minor" event brings new evidence of the
staggering social changes in the upcoming world power.

http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/07/29/opinion/melik30.php

*************************

The Guardian, July 30, 2005
Chinese art prices surge as spending power increases
Jonathan Watts in Beijing

A Beijing auction house sold a landscape by Chang Ta-chien for more than
£5m yesterday, the latest sign that China's supercharged economy is
inflating worldwide prices for the country's art.

The 1968 work, Ten Thousand Mile Landscape, a 34.5 metre-wide image of
the Yangtze river, fetched 73m million yuan, one of the highest prices
paid for a Chinese painting.

The auctioneers, Beijing Zhongbang, declined to reveal the name of the
buyer, but he or she is among a growing number willing to splash out
millions on works that were worth less than half as much only two years
ago. From Qing-dynasty pottery to contemporary installations, the values
of almost every type of Chinese art are surging, along with
international interest in its heritage.

Article continues
Chang's work was always likely to interest buyers. He died in 1983 at
the age of 84, renowned throughout the artworld for his traditional ink
landscapes and innovative "splash of colour" technique.

But he is not alone in attracting attention. At a Christie's sale in
Hong Kong in May, an unnamed Asian collector paid a record HK$16m
(£1.1m) for a Chinese oil painting - Zhao Wuji's largest triptych,
Juin-Octobre 85.

And this month, Christie's in London sold a Ming jar to an anonymous
western collector for £15.7m, a record for any Asian work of art.

The boom has several causes. It is a product of an economy that has
grown at more than 8% a year for two decades and also reflects a change
in China as it rediscovers a passion for art.

But with prices rising and hidden works becoming available, there are
fears that a free market in art might be detrimental to China's heritage.

This year the government in Beijing asked the US to restrict imports of
Chinese art amid concerns that many cultural treasures were being looted
for sale abroad.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/arts/news/story/0,11711,1539324,00.html

*************************

NYT, July 26, 2005
A Surge in Chinese Art Sales, Driven by History
By SOUREN MELIKIAN - International Herald Tribune

The massive entry of citizens from the People's Republic of China into
the Chinese art market has become a common topic in the media. The focus
is nearly always on the financial consequences or the nationalism that
supposedly drives the new players.

Whether the Chinese are any more nationalist in buying their own art
than the British when buying Wedgwood porcelain or Georgian furniture is
a moot question. What truly underlies Chinese acquisitions is a renewed
awareness of history that the Maoist Cultural Revolution tried to wipe
out and a new eagerness to reconnect with the cultural tokens of the past.

This eagerness, common to all Chinese communities, has radically changed
the makeup of Chinese art auctions in the West, now largely determined
by Chinese preferences. Three decades ago the big lots were so-called
"archaic" bronzes from Chinese Antiquity, Tang pottery, Song porcelain,
early Ming blue and white porcelain and, occasionally, some important
Buddhist sculpture.

Not any more. Taking Christie's July 12 sale as the most spectacular
example, there were few archaic bronzes and hardly any Tang pots.
Tradition-minded Chinese buyers will not touch them. Recovered from
tombs, they imply that ancestral remains were disturbed. Nor will
traditionalists acquire Buddhist sculpture hacked away from cave temples
or recovered from underground digs. None of these were to be seen at
Christie's.

By contrast, hosts of objects that would not have been given much
consideration were lavishly reproduced in the catalogue. All were dear
to the hearts of those cast in the Mandarin mold or eager to see
themselves as heirs to the tradition. They included rhinoceros horn wine
cups, jade objets d'art, all intricately carved, and plenty of Qing
dynasty porcelain.

The one object in the July 12 sale that would have excited great
admiration in the 1970s was a blue and white jar of the mid-14th century
painted with scenes dealing with the history of China under the Warring
States.

The vigorous shape, and the energy with which the figures are painted,
would have sent into ecstasy the Japanese in the 1970s, when they were
driving the Chinese art market, but not the overseas Chinese when they
in turn became a significant force in the 1980s.

They showed little interest in Yuan or early Ming porcelain. Most of
them saw their shapes and large sizes as alien to Chinese tradition, and
rightly so. These were introduced into China by the Mongols after they
conquered China and Iran. Vessels suited to the Iranian royal banquet
suddenly made an appearance - large trays for mounds of rice, large wine
ewers and wine jars.

The first sign of a change in Chinese attitudes to blue and white came
in September 2003 in a New York sale held at Doyle's. Four of the finest
Ming blue and white vessels went to Xu Ximing, a businessman from
Ningbo, in Zhejian Province, who had made his money in the eel trade.
(Eels are a delicacy on the Chinese menu.)

The vessels that the collector from central China acquired shared two
characteristics. They came from an old American collection and they had
imperial marks on the underside. The old American provenance was part of
their attraction. Chinese buyers taking home works of art from old
Western collections can enjoy the feeling of recovering heirlooms taken
out of the country in the days when China was weak, politically and
economically.

The imperial mark topped this with a more cogent appeal. Western dealers
often speak disparagingly of the Chinese love for inscribed imperial
objects as if it were evidence of nouveau-riche vanity. In fact, the
palace has always been at the heart of Chinese history. Seeking imperial
objects is a more exalted way of reconnecting with old China and
dreaming about past splendor.

On July 12, the search for cultural roots through history was more in
evidence than ever. The blue and white jar shot up to an extraordinary
£15.68 million, or $27.7 million, setting a record for any work of art
from Asia. What happened?

The jar, of which only seven related examples are known, none in
continental China, had links with Chinese history, recent and old.

It had been acquired by a Captain Baron Haro van Hemert tot Dingshof
stationed in Beijing from 1913 to 1923. A commander of the Netherlands
Legation Guards Detachment, he was in charge of security in the Dutch,
German and Austro-Hungarian legations. To any Chinese ear, this came as
a reminder of the days when a Western military presence amounted to
thinly disguised colonial intrusion. Getting back the jar would have
felt like settling old scores.

More important, however, was the link with the distant history of China.
Not only were the scenes illustrated taken from a popular
semi-historical work composed in the early 14th century, but in two
cases, as Christie's expert, Rosemary Scott, observed in a finely
researched essay, they followed almost to the letter those illustrated
in the sole surviving copy of that book in its edition of the years 1321
to 1323. This made it a unique document of Chinese cultural history. It
establishes beyond the shred of a doubt the role played by Chinese
woodblock editions in 14th-century porcelain workshops at the highest
level - which Christie's did not say.

The Chinese responded. Up to £10 million, already an unheard of figure,
some of them were still in the running. In the end they were defeated.
Giuseppe Eskenazi of London, the world's leading dealer in early Chinese
art, carried the prize on behalf of a client who was, he told me, "a
Westerner who has been collecting Chinese porcelain for 10 years." If
there is a next time, meaning if another splendid object of major
significance to Chinese cultural history turns up, my bet is they might
hang on.

At lower financial levels, Chinese buyers already showed remarkable
stamina. Their passion for history took a political turn with an
imperial carved lacquer dated 1788.

The imperial panel, which technically speaking is a tour de force, shows
junks sailing toward a hilly land where an army stands in battle order.
The composition is borrowed from one of the engravings commissioned by
the Qianlong emperor to commemorate his repression of a Taiwan uprising.
Five lines of gilt Chinese characters reproduce a poem describing the
battle. At the end, a seal calls the panel the "Treasure of the Son of
Heaven." No Chinese collector could resist that. One, bidding
anonymously, raised the stakes to a prodigious £433,600, a world record
in its category.

This was outdone by another work of art with an imperial aura. The blue
and white vase painted with a peach tree improbably hanging over rolling
waves has a shape that is as beautiful as it is rare. Only one
comparable example, in the Palace Museum, Beijing, is known. Christie's
vase, sure enough, is inscribed with the Qianlong six-character seal on
the underside. But there is more to it than its imperial provenance.

Christie's expert considered the numbers of five flying bats (which
symbolize the "Five Blessings": longevity, wealth, health, virtue and
the allotted life span) and nine peaches to be a rebus for "nine-five,"
a number combination reserved for the emperor's use.

"Attaining the position of the nine-five" is an expression used during
the Tang dynasty to mean "becoming the emperor." From this, the expert
deduced that "the vase was made to celebrate the Qianlong emperor's
birthday." It seems to me that the "nine-five" points to a more
important conclusion. The vase was made to celebrate the accession to
the throne of the Qianlong emperor. This dates it to 1736, explaining
why it is so close to the style of the previous Yongzheng reign, which
the catalogue refrains from noting.

A Chinese dealer, probably acting as an agent, paid £624,000 for one of
the most important gems of Chinese cultural history seen in a long time.
To treat such acquisitions as syndromes of nouveau-riche fever is a
curious Western misperception. Never underestimate the Chinese - nor any
of the old cultures of the East, for that matter.

http://www.nytimes.com/iht/2005/07/26/arts/IHT-26melik23.html?pagewanted=print

***********************

Kunstmarkt.com/Stefan Kobel, 27.07.2005
Ergebnisse der Asiatika-Auktion bei Klefisch in Köln
Lichterfüllte Holzschnitte
[image] Negoro Raizan, Shinagawa no yoru, um 1923

Ein dunkler See im silbernen Schein des Mondes, schemenhafte Häuser am
Ufer – die japanische Kunst hatte sich durch die Berührung mit dem
Abendland sowie dem Impressionismus inspirieren lassen und brachte
Anfang des 20. Jahrhunderts Werke hervor, welche der in
jahrhundertelanger Tradition erstarrten Holzschnittkunst auch im
internationalen Kontext Gültigkeit verliehen. Moderne Holzschnitte waren
daher bei Trudel Klefischs Asiatika-Auktion am 16. Juli in Köln nicht
von ungefähr die beliebtesten Objekte und wechselten nahezu vollständig
ihre Besitzer. „Shinagawa no yoru“ – “Nachts bei Shinagawa” – von Negoro
Raizan etwa ging bei einer Taxe von 900 bis 1.100 Euro für 2.400 Euro in
eine europäische Privatsammlung.

Teurer war allerdings eine chinesische Malerei, ebenfalls aus dem 20.
Jahrhundert: Direkt aus dem Atelier des Malers Qi Bashi stammt ein 1952
entstandenes Papierbild mit der Darstellung eines Hahns, der unter einem
Birnenzweig einem feuerroten Insekt nachstellt. Europäischer Handel
genehmigte hierfür 18.000 Euro (Taxe 15.000 bis 20.000 EUR). Auch eine
Snuffbottle verdankte ihren Höhenflug der Malerei. Ma Shao-Xuan, ein
berühmter Vertreter der Peking-Schule hatte sie zur Thronbesteigung
Georg V. von England mit dessen Portrait verziert. Ein deutscher Sammler
im Saal griff bei 6.700 Euro beherzt zu (Taxe 800 bis 1.000 EUR).

Ebenfalls den Bildkünsten zuzurechnen ist ein aus drei Bahnen
zusammengesetzter sogenannter Palastteppich, den ein chinesischer
Sammler von 3.000 bis 3.600 Euro auf 7.000 Euro hob. Beim chinesischen
Porzellan machte eine Schale mit grünlicher Seladonglasur der südlichen
Song-Zeit aus der Sammlung Roselt mit 6.500 Euro das Rennen (Taxe 500
bis 800 EUR), das chinesischer Handel für sich entschied. Ein auf 300
bis 400 Euro geschätztes bewegliches Gerät mit unklarer Funktion aus
Jadeit motivierte einen chinesischen Sammler zu einem Gebot in Höhe von
2.200 Euro.

Netsuke wurden hauptsächlich von Europäern und Japanern gekauft, da sich
Amerikaner aufgrund des Dollarkurses zurückhielten. So ging „Ningyo
schwimmend“ aus Elfenbein für 14.000 Euro in eine deutsche Sammlung
(Taxe 3.500 bis 4.500 EUR), während sich ein englischer Bieter einen
„Minkoku“ signierten hölzernen Karpfen für 13.000 Euro zuschlagen ließ
(Taxe 5.000 bis 7.000 EUR). Bei einem Daruma, aus einem Buch über
Zen-Mondo lesend, hatte ein japanischer Bieter das Nachsehen gegenüber
einem russischen Sammler, der 6.000 Euro genehmigte (Taxe 4.000 bis
5.000 EUR).

Mit dem ersten Teil der Sammlung Noetzel kamen 51 Porzellan-Netsuke zum
Aufruf, die reißenden Absatz fanden – nur vier Stück blieben ohne
Käufer. Bei Taxen zwischen 140 und 600 Euro waren Amerikaner wieder mit
dabei. Teuerstes Objekt wurde mit 1.800 Euro der naturalistische Kopf
eines Lachses mit der Signatur „Kenzan“ in seinem Inneren (Taxe 300 bis
360 Euro).

Alle Ergebnisse verstehen sich als Zuschlag ohne das Aufgeld.

 

__________________

with kind regards,

Matthias Arnold
(Art-Eastasia list)

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

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