He has this mania for Chinese contemporary art is causing a wave of criticism. There are allegations that the university uses the auction houses in mainland China to raise prices and to engage in large-scale speculation, as if they were trading in stocks or real estate. University accused the West of speculation, by artists who say they are buying cheap and then sell it works ten times the original price, and sometimes more.
Find those who have entered this market in the last three years, contemporary Chinese art is safe bet that prices have doubled with each sale. He brought the first sale of Sotheby’s New York Contemporary Art Asia, dominated by Chinese artists, a total of $ 13 million in March 2006 and the sale of the same month of last March, won the $ 23 million, and sales Sotheby Hong Kong for Chinese contemporary art in April amounted to about $ 34 million. The Christie in Hong Kong contemporary art sales in Asia since 2004. The dwarf of 2005 total sales of U.S. $ 11 million in total $ 40.7 million from the sale of one afternoon in May of this year.
These figures, as it is impressive, do not start to move the huge success of the auction of a handful of Chinese artists: Zhang Xiaogang, Cai Guo Qiang Yu Minjun, Liu Xiaodong and Liu Yi. The leader of this year, Chi Cheng, who mask Issue 6 (1996) sold for $ 9.6 million, a record for Chinese contemporary art at Christie’s Hong Kong in May.
Saw Zhang Xiaogang, who paints large, faces grim reminder of family photos taken during the Cultural Revolution, the record of U.S. $ 76,000 in 2003, when an oil painting, which first appeared in Hong Kong Christie’s for $ 2 , 3 million in November 2006, to 6.1 million in April this year.
He led a group of 14 works of $ 9.5 million in November, gunpowder drawings by Cai Guo Qiang, who won a recent retrospective at the Guggenheim Museum in New York, sold for less than $ 500,000 in 2006.
According to the price index of art, Chinese artists took 35 of the 100 higher prices for the lives of contemporary artists at auction last year, Jeff Koons competition, Damien Hirst, and a large group of Western artists.
“Everyone is looking to the East and China, and the art market is no different,” says Kevin Ching, CEO of Sotheby’s Asia. “Despite the mortgage crisis in the United States or the fact that some of the financial markets, seems strained, and the business community in general, is still a lot of confidence in China, boosted by the Olympics and the Expo Shanghai World in 2010. ”
There are signs, however, the Chinese international art market has begun to decline. In Sotheby’s sale of contemporary Asian art in the month of March, which provides 20 percent of lots found no buyers, and even works of the authors of the records from the likes of Zhang Xiaogang only estimates are low. “The market is increasingly mature, so they can not sell the most,” said Zhang Xiaoming, Chinese modern and contemporary art specialist at Sotheby’s New York. “We have become very smart collectors and focus only on some of the artists, and the periods of insurance, and materials.”
For its part, Western galleries are eagerly pursuing Chinese artists, many of which were unknown until recently. Zeng Qi, for example, was signed by the Acquavella Gallery in New York in a deal for two years to exceed $ 20 million, according to the Beijing gallerist close to the negotiations, William Acquavella declined to comment. He joined Huan Zhang Xiaogang and Zhang, PaceWildenstein and Yu and Liu Xiaodong showed with Mary Boone last spring. It has happened in almost every major gallery in New York recently Chinese artist Yan Pei Ming, David Zwirner Shaw James Cohan at Chen Huang Yong Ping at Gladstone, Yang Fudong Marian Goodman and Liu Yi Sperone Westwater. Enter your private and public collections so far have not shown any particular interest in contemporary art in Asia.
“The market does not behave as expected,” says New York dealer Max Protetch, representing artists from China since 1996. “We expected that all Chinese artists will go through a process of criticism itself is happening with art in any other place in the world, and I guess some of the artists and is on the side of the road, which was not true, all of which are high, and it seems the market without control “.
One of the most important artists of this success is the support of the Zeng Zhi was famous for his series “The Mask”. Five years ago, sells his works under $ 50,000. He is currently commands prices in the primary market is closer to $ 1 million, with major collectors Charles Saatchi and Jose from the Moroccan public. Now he prepares for his first solo at Acquavella in December, is one of the most serious artists on the scene in Beijing that works alone, without a group of assistants in the studies of most artists in China. Follow the pattern of his life is typical of their peers with the same success. When asked if there was a giant black Hummer parked outside his studio, he replied: “No, this car is ugly I have a G5-Benz ..”
This success has flourished under the watchful eye of Chinese government. Subject to strict control of film, television and news agencies, but in general, and visual arts are not. Despite isolated incidents of exposures that are closing or customs officials confiscated works of art, largely on the government supported the growth of the art market does not interfere with private sector activity. In the neighborhood of the Gallery 798 in Beijing, a Bauhaus-style complex ammunition earlier moved to the center of the capital’s hottest art, with over 150 galleries, are the works to combat poverty and other social problems and the official corruption, and sexual habits of the new. It is the flag of the symbols of treatment of former workers in China and happy peasants and heroic soldiers raise red with irony, however, by the artists and the works on display in this exhibition, which is the special place that are not usually subject to strict control of the Ministry of Culture.
On the eve of the Olympics, however, a government request to postpone the exhibition until after the exhibition games. And it was not appropriate is “Touch”, which appeared from Shin In Beijing Baozhong of 15 paintings depicting important moments in the history of China, including those based on a photograph shows Mao Zedong with the Dalai Lama and the Panchen Lama 1954.
He spent huge amounts of money for the restoration of the Beijing Municipal District 798 before the Olympics, taking the cobbled streets and resurfacing the main road with cafes. Shanghai, which had the support of less government, now has fewer than 100 concerts. Local governments across the country and the establishment of areas like SoHo gallery to promote tourism.
One person seems confident about the future of the Chinese market, Arne Glimcher, founder and president of PaceWildenstein, which opened a branch of the exhibition held in Beijing in August. Located in an area of 22,000 square meters of cement with high ceilings, the design cost of $ 20 million by architect Richard Gluckman, and exposure in the Middle District of 798. “We are committed to art, and we wanted to open the gallery where artists we have is,” says Glimcher. He said he usually avoids “McGallery” trend of creating satellite spaces in various parts of the world, Glimcher insists on the need to establish a branch in Beijing, because “there rounds of local art gallery to have a” Pace , which can be partners. He, however, recruited Lin Ling, the founder of the Commune, Beijing, and another gallery in 798, to be Director.
Another operator has taken the western China drown Arthur Solway, which recently opened a branch of the James Cohan in Shanghai. “I started coming to China five years ago, and I was fascinated by the energy,” says Solway, who wanted to enter the gallery artists like Bill Viola, Wim Wenders, and Roxy Paine to Asia, but, as Glimcher, no can be found in the public museum or gallery, especially the professional is to deal with such exposures. James Cohan Gallery Find Shanghai on the ground floor of the structure of Art Deco, 1936 in the French Concession, and particularly scenic section of the city. Once the building was occupied by the army, and the red Chinese characters on the front door exhorts: “Let the spirit of Mao Tse-tung to prosper 10,000 years.”
“From 1966 to 1976, during the Cultural Revolution, people were nothing, but now there are resorts in Shanghai, people drink cappuccinos and buying Rolex watches, it is amazing phenomenon,” says Solway, who believes that is only a matter of time before these same consumers rich new beginning in the contemporary art collection.
China University or hope that there will be Chinese collectors, is to call key to attracting such exhibitions in Beijing. Recently as two years ago, few could name even a collector of contemporary Chinese art. It was obvious that the Chinese prefer to spend their money to get the effects and the classics. Since then there have been several continental university is known in the scene.
The most obvious is the Guan Yi, mild mannered, dressed heir to the wealth of chemical engineering, which moved to the museum’s collection of over 500 works of quality. The lead lender retroactively Huang Yong Ping, organized by the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis in 2005, which entertains regularly the conservatives around the world, which made the pilgrimage to the winery on the outskirts of Beijing. He is now the museum building itself.
Other services said Zhang Lan, head of the South Beauty chain Szechuan style restaurants in all parts of China, which also picked up an enviable set shows a part of it in the institutions that have elegant. Actress Zhang Ziyi is the representative of a new class of collectors from the entertainment industry, while the Pan Shiyi and Zhang Xin, chairman and CEO of SOHO China Empire, real estate giant, has commissioned the high-end projects residential properties.
Two collectors who advocate for the art scene in Beijing, Yang Bin, a car industry hub, elections, and Roy Zhang, CEO of telecommunications, which also supports the Arts Beijing Gallery now, and who participated in Art Basel June, one of the first galleries to appear at the Beijing show. These do more than collecting art. Hosted a dinner for their potential for collectors, and organizing trips to the Art Basel Miami Beach, and brought their friends with them for sale in London and New York. He has performed, Zhang Rui, who owns more than 500 works, and art to participate in international exhibitions, especially the installation of the morning, with four “dead Beatles” floating face-down models, created by one of the Peng Yu Yuan artist, Liverpool Biennial 2006, which rejected it.
Zhang said the hotel building now has art, specially commissioned works, the rooms designed by artists outside the Workers’ Stadium in central Beijing. “I’m trying to think of ways to change the group to a public-private group,” Zhang said through an interpreter ARTnews. It is not economically beneficial to do so in China, and did not realize the tax benefits of donations to museums and other nonprofit organizations.
Rui Zhang is a handful of Chinese art collectors who are public about their activities and construction groups are noteworthy. More typical for the purchase of activity in China is rampant speculation taking place in the auction houses on the continent. There are 1600 auctions and sales to attract hundreds of exhibitors. Chinese buyers feel more comfortable with the auction houses that have been in business since 1994, with the galleries that are not licensed to operate by the government until late 1990.
These auction houses charge of their own rules, and generating what sometimes seems like a “wild, wild East” atmosphere. Is, for example, are common for a house for shipments directly from the artists, who use and sales to determine the price of their work in the primary market. More often than not, and now that China has hundreds of galleries, dealers come up for sale to buyers in the clouds, and even bid on public works to install the “high” and announced its artists. Take into account this type of ring bidding is illegal in the United States, but China is seen as doing business acumen. There is little regulation and auction houses few legal rules made in this area, so that even when buyers have grievances with the false and fraudulent, for example, feel they can not resort to the law. Offers and social as well as a business, and buyers are happy to show their status by paying record prices or quickly flip art, not only for profit, but to boast of short-term gains.
Because the local market for contemporary art matures, however, many of these practices is concerned. “Two years ago it was necessary for me to make my best artists of the auction,” said Fang Fang, owner of Star Gallery in Beijing, which specializes in emerging young artists Ke Chen and Gao Yu. “Now that the market has increased, and I think it best to keep my artists outside the auction rooms, and there is no reason to sell, much less there.”
Chinese companies, Beijing Poly International Auction Co., China Guardian Auctions Co., dominate the field of contemporary Chinese art. 2007 amount represents the combined total of more than $ 200 million in sales of about two thirds of the total auction sales of this category in mainland China this year. Guardian Spring achieved after $ 142 million in sales of classic works of art, furniture, ceramics, silver, coins, and $ 40 million in sales of contemporary materials. And the latter figure includes $ 8.2 million to bring Liu Xiaodong, No. 1 culture broth, which is a record of the painting is sold on the continent. In a similar set of sales last spring, Poly sold $ 130 million for the work, including $ 27 million in a settlement on the evening of contemporary art. (These figures represent a slight decrease over the year as both home sales, which was held at the Sichuan earthquake victims, raising more than $ 20 million to support relief efforts.)
The Guardian Polly reflect two different perspectives are very different in the local market in the contemporary Chinese art. Guardian Auction House is the oldest and most respected in China, which was founded in 1993, Wang Yannan, the daughter of Zhao Ziyang, former Communist Party leader, who was placed under house arrest after opposing the use of government force against demonstrators in Tiananmen Square in 1989. If it was known as Polly to its vast resources and its willingness to bid for items of NAB, which is known to specialists in the relationship tutor and client relationships in the long term. For example, when sending the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, decided to sell 20 pieces of porcelain from the Qing Dynasty in mainland China, and the collection of The Guardian.
Climate for sale in poly or guardian surprisingly similar to that in the salerooms of Christie or Sotheby’s. The catalogs are identical in design, and the result of bids in an orderly, quiet, despite the crowd of spectators in the courtroom.
“Since the beginning for us, and we have studied the principles of the auction house should be, and we adhere to these principles,” said Wang, director of The Guardian. He also serves on the Board of Directors of the Christie’s auction new to the national level, “waiting to apply the rules in the auction market.
Polly is an institution within the institution of China Poly Group, a conglomerate of $ 30 billion that was allocated to a branch of People’s Liberation Army. Founded on the principle of a new work of art and antiques, and spent $ 100 million to buy poly things like animal heads watch looted bronze fountain of the Summer Palace in Beijing by British and French troops in 1860, and the pieces later appeared in the West. He offered his objects in the Museum of Art at the new Poly Poly Plaza in Beijing, a glass tower designed by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill.
It is known that more than Poly irresponsible practices such as setting auction of works of their own or the presence of senders to ensure that it will bring buyers to the sale to comply with the estimates are low. However, even here there are signs that the market is mature, and is too expensive for casual speculators. “These complex, we’re talking about is actually a very small college,” said Xu Chao, a senior adviser in the Poli. “Purchased for several years at very reasonable prices, but now that rates jump, and the only way I can afford to buy and sell, and collectors know beforehand that comes from the case of high social, and were able to buy a piece of $ 1 million or the equivalent of 2 million and future are for the best deal, and antiques, in addition to their collections. ”
When asked if Poly follows the rules of Western auction houses, strong Zhao replied: “Sometimes even Sotheby not follow the rules.” Or Jisui Gong, a specialist in the art market, a professor at the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing, says: “The Chinese have learned the game from the predictions of Westerners who played for the first time.”
Incident, which indicates both men is the sale of Stella Group Sotheby’s Hong Kong on 9 April this year. The event garnered $ 18 million for 108 works. (In addition, 80 works will be on sale this month at Sotheby’s New York) is a set together 2003-2006 by New York dealer Michael Goedhuis of a group of investors that included Sasha Lainovic, director of Weight Watchers International, Raymond Debbane , Executive Invus Group, a private equity firm.
Last year we sold about 200 sets of works by William Acquavella, who was extradited to Sotheby’s. Officials were trying to auction house did not discuss financial details, but Sotheby’s held a stake in the group. After the sale has been widely reported that the wrath of many artists in the auction because he said he sold his business to Goedhuis at discount prices in exchange for promises that the collection will stay together for public display.
“The idea is to keep the collection intact and safe to view at some institutions,” says Goedhuis, which denies that any promises made. “The situation was perfect for viewing with the Foundation in China, due to the absence of a group.” The group published a book, and China forward, along with a most important item in China expert Britta Erickson, which was exhibited at the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art in Denmark, and the Israel Museum in Jerusalem shortly before the sale . According to Goedhuis, due to the rapid rise in prices, investors opted to sell the collection with the hope that it will split.
“From the museums of China is not mature enough, it is not rich enough to make an acquisition like this, and I hope that Steve Wynn do so at their casino resort in Macao sophisticated,” says Goedhuis. I turned to Acquavella because, he says, he believed that the dealer will take the group to win, Acquavella paid $ 25 million. Acquavella director Michael Findlay laughs at the idea that there was no evidence that the collection will go to Wayne. “I think this is surrounded by a lot of rumors and speculation,” he says. “We bought a collection of paintings, sell a collection of paintings, and this is the whole story.”
According to Martin ten Holder, Sotheby director for North America and South America, the company was consulted prior to the sale of several artists in the collection and wondered why he was scheduled to work a public auction. There is no agreement on whether the Goedhuis company is committed to keeping the collection together or just making a sales pitch that the inclusion of artists in the group improve its reputation. Yue Minjun, who worked two jobs in the sale, he says, made no promises. He bought Goedhuis Zeng Qi, Chairman Mao Hanart we TZ Gallery in 2005 for the price, $ 30,000, the discount given. Sold for $ 1.18 million.
“You have to understand that there is no market for this work when you are buying,” says Howard Farber, who collected $ 20 million brought in Phillips de Pury & Company in London last October. Farber assembled 100 of the selected works of visiting artists’ studios diligently in Beijing in late 1980, accompanied by Karen Smith and critic based in Beijing, is the author of the leading and coordination in this area. The job paid $ 25,000 in 1996, criticism of Wang Guangyi Great: The sale of Coca-Cola, Phillips de Pury in $ 1.6 million. The buyer Farber son, Larry Warsh, who introduced many of the businesses in the sale, according to news reports. “I really do not really know I was going to buy and Wang Guangyi until that time,” says Lars. “Howard and his group, and it is not my collection, and there are many pieces you want in this group that I wanted to buy, but can not afford.”
Many of the agreements with Beijing artists workshops for the production of your company and its Technical Advisory, which began in 2004, inspired by the example of Farber in this area. “I loved it from China, and then I had a love for the art of China, as I learned about the important artists,” says Lars. “But what really caught my attention first was the way that prices do not make sense to me at all, was out of service.”
Warsh, who amassed a collection of works by Jean-Michel Basquiat, Keith Haring and Kenny Scharf in the 1980′s, the editor of the now defunct magazine, museums, and sold to LTB Media in 2004. He said that at one time his collection of over 1200 works, and now, he says, has about 400 paintings and photographs. And managed part of his collection through his new office, AW Asia, which has an exhibition at the Chelsea and intends to compile collections of contemporary art museums in China and major private collectors. Museum of Modern Art in New York recently got 23 photos from AW Asia.
With Farber and workshops in circulation in Beijing for a variety of purposes, and it was easy for Chinese artists to be confused about who was buying them, and for any purpose. In recent interviews, and most artists, including several Zhang Xiaogang, which reached an agreement with Arch, noting as an example of a speculator.
Replies Arc “, while some artists are not happy with his decision to have sold a lot of works of art in what was known then the current values is not far, and there are many artists who do not feel resentful and We are pleased that someone has really taken an interest in their work. ”
New York, Jack Tilton dealer, who has worked with Chinese artists since 1999, says: “All these artists and hope to find their homes a good place to get beaten in the commercial market, but also played a role in this market, embracing capitalism over what we have, and fun ways. We are not naive about any of these things. ”
When asked about the reactions of artists to sell his collection, Daze Farber: “What’s in it now and I’m a bad man and that bothers me?”
There are a number of collectors of contemporary art from the Chinese who were in the field for some time and cling to their collections. It has built an initial Sigg, Swiss ambassador to China, Mongolia and North Korea from 1995 to 1998, a major business group, which toured the exhibition “Mahjong” to museums throughout Europe and, more recently, the University of the Arts in Berkeley, California Museum (September 10 – January 4). They have used the individual Belgian collectors Myriam Ullens and resources to create the first nonprofit contemporary art center in Beijing, where he currently collecting historical exhibition. So far, the collection of Charles Saatchi clung to their shopping in preparation for the opening of the new exhibition in London in nine of the next month with the presentation of contemporary Chinese art, and also launched a website for artists from mainland China may be the last.
Compared with the purchase of Western declined involvement mainland China. Although there were many rumors about the ability of the new Chinese buyers, and their presence has not been seen in the major auction houses, which are set more records. “Hong Kong is now covers global buyers, especially those from different parts of Asia,” says Eric Chang, Christie’s international director for contemporary art in Asia. “I do not see buyers and mainland China, less than 10 percent, down from 12 percent.” Operators in China has also seen a few of the Continental Collection customers. “I do not know yet for collectors,” says New York dealer Christophe Mao Cameras Art Arts, which recently opened a branch in Beijing.