One is an old tree root that resembles a human organ; another a small rock that, despite its polished surface, looks too crude to warrant a second glance. Not exactly items you might consider for the living room yet these so-called 'objects of contemplation' were once sought after by Chinese literati.
Intellectual elites centuries ago believed aesthetics went beyond surface beauty and its appreciation could only be cultivated. For them, ugliness was just another form of sublime beauty.
This week, Sotheby's is revisiting, and reviving, interest in these objects by putting a series of them on the block. This is the second time the auction house is staging a sale on this scale for the genre: more than 40 lots will come under the hammer on Thursday. In 2008, all but one of the 27-lot Jiansongge Collection were sold, fetching HK$18.4 million.
Nicolas Chow, international head of Chinese ceramics and works of art at Sotheby's and who co-ordinated both sales, says the taste for these objects goes back to the Song dynasty (AD960-1279) when it was 'very much in vogue'. It continued until the early 20th century but by the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976), it had almost disappeared.
'In Chinese objects, it's one of the most sophisticated tastes that ever developed,' says Chow, who holds a master's degree in arts and archaeology from the University of London.
'Back in the Song dynasty, you have poets and painters discussing the merits of strangeness or ugliness in objects. That's something the West only discovered much later because the West was very much influenced by the classicism of Greek and Roman art; it took centuries for the West to free itself from those limits.