The Collector | Chinese art market has its mojo back, China Guardian Beijing’s spring auctions show

Last month’s China Guardian Beijing sales smacked of six years ago.

“Bidding for the Huang Binhong started at 68 million yuan [HK$78 million, US$10 million]. Early offers quickly pushed it up to 100 million yuan and subsequent bids were going up in 10 million increments at least,” said Guo Tong, the house’s head of Chinese paintings, who was accompanying her boss, Chen Dongsheng, on a visit to Hong Kongthis month.

“There were seven, eight bidders remaining after the 200 million yuan mark and it took 35 minutes altogether to sell the painting. I haven’t seen such enthusiasm since 2011.”

Huang’s Yellow Mountain (1955) eventu­ally sold for 345 million yuan, including fees. Notwithstanding the fact that it is a great example of the brush and ink techniques that Huang, an eminent art historian, propa­gated, it was extra­ordinary that someone would pay the equivalent of US$50 million for a work by an artist whose previous auction record was a mere 63 million yuan, set just three years ago.

Until now, Huang’s works have never approached the levels of more renowned modern Chinese artists such as Zhang Daqian and Qi Baishi. But this sale puts him ahead of the popular Zhang, whose most expensive work, Peach Blossom Spring (1982), sold for HK$270.7 million at a Sotheby’s Hong Kong sale in 2016.