Chinese Works of Art

A leading US culture lawyer has testified at Washington, DC trade hearings about how a Chinese art import tariff would have a negative effect on small and medium-sized US dealers.

Topping two days of steady selling and 750 wide-ranging lots at Leominster saleroom Brightwells’ (17.5% buyer’s premium) summer auction was a Republic period cong-form vase in the style of the renowned Qianjiang School artist Wang Yeting.

The pair to the famous ‘Bain bridge vase’ – knocked down at £43m in 2010 but later sold for half that sum – has come to market. Sotheby’s will sell the near identical vase, that has a century-long provenance, in Hong Kong in the autumn

William Martindale holds an exhibition with textile specialist Jacqueline Simcox at Stoppenbach and Delestre during Asian Art in London (November 1-10).

Dealers and auctioneers in the US and UK are mobilising in the hope of removing works of art from the thousands of items caught up in the escalating US-China trade war.

It’s a rare sale these days at which an English furniture standard challenges quality Chinese pieces for price, but the top end of the trade certainly rated a 6ft 3in (1.9m) William and Mary walnut and featherbanded bureau cabinet offered by Bearnes Hampton & Littlewood (21% buyer’s premium).

The US-China trade war, previously the stuff of new technology, heavy industry and agribusiness, has now opened a new front: cultural heritage. The threat of a 25% tariff on imported Chinese art and antiques will soon be discussed in Washington, DC.

Stuttgart auction house Nagel (33% buyer’s premium) held its summer sale of Asian art in Salzburg having acquired an impressive array of quality pieces from European and other collections.

"He had taken a taxi from Heathrow to Easingwold. After fierce bidding on the phones and internet he bought it, put it in his suitcase and the taxi was still waiting outside the saleroom with the meter ticking to go back to Heathrow.”

Chinese art specialist Priestley & Ferraro has moved to a new location in St James’s. The new address is 3 Bury Street, not far from 17 King Street where it had been located since 1996.

Well-provenanced Chinese monochromes dominated bidding at recent Asian art sales across the UK regions.

Chinese ceramics tend to dominate Asian sales in the UK, but occasionally other mediums get to share the limelight.