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10月15日
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CONTROVERSIAL PROVENANCE
Prior to the entry of private mainland collectors into the market, the responsibility for such patriotic purchases was shouldered by entities like the China Poly Group Corporation, a publicly-owned enterprise that is commercially active in real estate, natural resources, and military hardware but also uses its buying power to bring Chinese antiquities back to the mainland. Many of these items go into the Poly Museum collection, while some are sold on by its subsidiary Poly Auctions, which along with Guardian dominates the Chinese auction scene.
BELLS-AND-WHISTLES CRAFTSMANSHIP
The Bainbridge vase is an extravagant mélange of styles and techniques — "a showcase for the complex craftsmanship that distinguishes Qianlong porcelain," according to Dong Guoqiang, the general manager of Beijing-based Council Auctions. "It contains diverse glazes, there's a blue and white interior, foreign color painting, enamel, famille rose, golden outlining, hollowed-out carving, swirling, embossing and light engraving," he told ARTINFO China. "It shows the art of Qianlong-era porcelain at its height." Some, however, find the over-the-top vase to be a touch flamboyant. "The flourishing Qianlong age gave birth to fripperies," says Ma Weidu, one of China's foremost antiquities collectors and a television personality who hosts a program on CCTV. "This vase is gaudy. Really it is pretty, but that's all."
This "pretty" vase had an extra quality that guaranteed a bidding war. The piece is widely believed to be booty from the Old Summer Palace, which was razed by French and British troops during the Second Opium War in 1860. The destruction of the Palace is one of the most infamous acts of foreign aggression against China, and restoring to the motherland treasures looted at that time has become a national quest in China in recent years. This week the Chinese media has been full of comment to the effect that the need to do so justifies the extraordinary price paid for the vase.
THE POSSIBILITY OF MARKET JUICING
CHINESE NATIONALISMA HISTORY OF GOVERNMENT SUPPORT
Some Chinese observers see another layer to this story, and question whether it was really just patriotic bidding that spurred the record sale. Perhaps (goes the theory) there was collusion by interested parties in China — auction houses or others — who aimed to boost the market in advance of the auction season which is just about to begin in China. "Bidders from China were all over the place," says Gao Chao, a ceramics expert from Shenzhen's Jin Yi Bai Collection. "If it was really a patriotic act, what's the point in boosting the price? Fifty times higher than the estimate smells more like they were cooking the price than fighting for a piece of artwork they like." Others, however, have no problem believing it was a genuine case of passionate collectors competing for a historical trophy. "It's a piece of Qianlong porcelain," says noted collector Zeng Jingqun. "When you have one of those, you can never estimate its price solely on cultural or aesthetic value."
Cashed-up mainland Chinese collectors have rewritten the rule book on value in the Chinese art market, blending their phenomenal wealth generated by China's galloping economy with an intense desire to celebrate the country's ancient heritage as its profile rises on the world stage. Chinese collectors buying imperial treasures abroad see themselves as patriots reclaiming the nation's cultural patrimony. Dong Guoqiang says that when news of the upcoming sale of the Bainbridge vase got out, it spread fast in the collector community. "A lot of collectors asked me about this vase before the sale, and then promptly decided to 'take the flying taxi' to London," he says. Bainbridges had taken a private room in a Mayfair office building to show the piece, receiving a steady stream of Chinese collectors anxious to view it.，怀旧传奇页游地址：玩怀旧传奇页游就看这里