Travel ASIAN ART 13


One of the old atmospheric streets in the distinct French Concession in Shanghai, estbalished in 1849 and signed over to the then Chinese government in a treaty signed in Nanking in 1943


single most forged item in the history of Chinese art. Tere are only 19 other originals and it is believed that Yiqian’s is the only one in private hands. Yiqian paid using his American


Red Sandalwood Trone carved with Dragon and Cloud Design, Qianlong Reign, 1736 - 1795, Qing Dynasty. Collectio of Long Museum


early days. Recently the gallery


celebrated 20 years by relocating from the M50 art district, a complex of converted factories and warehouses off Moganshan Road that is now home to galleries and art studios, to the city’s newest incipient art hub, the West Bund Cultural Corridor a government funded attempt to turn several kilometres of neglected and long derelict industrial water frontage alongside the Huangpu River into a multi-billion dollar cultural centre. Since 2014, government money has poured in and private museums have been attracted to the area by sweetheart rental deals. Te Long Museum, and the Yuz Museum are private museums now on site with paintwork that is hardly dry. Owned by high-worth collectors but such as Wang Wei and Budi Tek respectively


they form the backbone of the visual art development. But springing up close by is Oriental DreamWorks which will include DreamCenter, a $US2.7 billion culture/entertainment complex due to open later this year. It is rumoured that Budi Tek, the


Indonesian founder of the 9,000 square metre Yuz Museum housed in an aircraft hangar that once served Longhua Airport will not pay ground rent for 30 years. Te building was repurposed by renowned Japanese architect Sou Fujimoto and opened in 2014. Tek’s taste in art is contemporary, mainly international and with a predisposition for huge works; Fed Sandback, Adel Abdessemed, Maurizio Cattelan, Zhang Xiaogang who now lives in New York, and of course Ai Weiwei, who last year relocated out of Beijing to the safety of Berlin.


Several galleries are now also on site


including the quixotic Xu Zhen’s MadeIn Gallery and the Edouard Malingue Gallery, the Hong Kong dealer’s first Mainland space. Karaoke king Qiao Zhibing has opened Qiao Space to show his personal contemporary art collection which is currently on show at his extravagant five-storey karaoke bar, Shanghai Night. For the adventurous traveller, a visit


to Shanghai Night is an


experience – albeit potentially a very expensive one – but you can see great art by the likes of Yang Fudong, Antony Gormley, and Olafur Eliasson and many others. Shanghai Night is a glamorous if slightly seedy place with squads of attractive young women on hand to help customers to spend their money.


Te billionaire art collector couple


Seated Buddha, Ming dynasty (1368-1644), lacquered wood, height 72cm, part of the collection at the Aurora Museum in Shanghai


Wang Wei and Liu Yiqian opened their second Long Museum in West Bund – their first was in Pudong in 2012 and both museums are dedicated to their extensive private art collection although West Bund does have curated shows. Wang Wei’s contemporary


Chinese


interest art


is in and


Revolutionary Art of which she seems to have cornered the market while her husband is the driving if somewhat mercurial force behind some staggering purchases of Chinese antiquities at auction. In 2014, he bought the tiny porcelain Meiyintang ‘Chicken Cup’ produced in the Chenhua reign (1465- 87) for US$36.3 million and proceeded to celebrate by drinking tea from it. According to Sotheby’s Nicholas Chow,


International Head and


Chairman of Chinese Works of Art Department, the Chicken Cup is the


Express Centurion Card. But the US$36 million price tag was a mere nothing compared to the US$170.4 million he paid in 2015 for Modigliani’s Reclining Nude. Again, he used his American Express card, but this time he insisted on a 12- month payment plan. At the time his wife, Wang Wei, is reported to have said, ‘Who has that sort of cash lying around?’. Quite so. One can spend hours in the Long Museums exploring the Revolutionary Art – think ruddy faced peasant girls and stirring portraits of the Great Helmsman – as well as the museum quality antiquities. I toured Pudong with Wang Wei, who proudly demonstrated how in the antiquities gallery the exhibition bays were only illuminated when a visitor


walk


through after which the lights faded. She then went on to complain about how much the monthly electricity bill was. North of West Bund is the Power


Station of Art (PSA), the country’s first publicly owned contemporary art museum and home to the Shanghai Biennale. Modelled on London’s Tate Gallery, it is a vast space but with little idea of how best to utilise the space. Plus there is not a lot inside to engage the visitor. So if time is tight then give PSA a miss. On the other side of the Huangpu


River from West Bund is the vast, even by Chinese standards, China Museum of Art. Originally designed as the China Pavilion for the Expo 2010, it has been repurposed as a museum. Looking very much like an Continued on page 14


Asian Art Auctions in Zurich: 13–14 June 2017


Viewing: 9 – 12 June


A magnificent caohuali wood imperial palace partition carved in double sided open work. China, 19th c. 287x396x11 cm.


Koller Auctions · Hardturmstrasse 102 ∙ 8031 Zurich Tel. +41 44 445 63 63 · office@kollerauctions.com www.kollerauctions.com


Asian_Art_260x178mm.indd 1 11.05.17 08:41 SUMMER QUARTER 2017 ASIAN ART


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