Zhang Xiaogang Is China’s Most-Valuable Artist, Hurun Says
Feb. 27 (Bloomberg) -- Zhang Xiaogang, Yue Minjun and Zeng Fanzhi are the most-valuable living Chinese artists, based on the auction prices of their works, shows a ranking by China-based Hurun Report, which also lists the nation’s richest people.
Works by Zhang, known for his somber, gray-hued paintings of Chinese families, fetched a combined $44.1 million at art auctions last year, followed by Yue’s $30.5 million and Zeng’s $30.1 million, according to Rupert Hoogewerf, Hurun’s Shanghai- based publisher. Works by the top 50 artists on Hurun’s list sold a combined $410 million at auction last year. Artists on the list averaged 57.5 years of age.
“Chinese collectors had begun to take an interest in contemporary art, which was until then mostly of interest to foreigners,” said Hoogewerf, in an e-mail.
Chinese contemporary art is broadly defined as works produced since the 1960s, and usually feature reflections and commentaries on the decade-long Cultural Revolution that seared the psyche of a generation of mainland Chinese.
Hoogewerf said demand for Chinese contemporary art grew slightly last year. Auction prices for this category rose in the first half and languished after the latest -- and worst -- round of credit crisis broke out in September.
In May, the most-expensive Chinese contemporary painting was sold at auction for the $9.7 million paid for Zeng’s “Mask Series 1996 No. 6” at Christie’s International’s Hong Kong sale.
 Zhang Xiaogang A Big Family,1995, Oil on canvas, 179 x 229 cm (Source Saatchi Gallery)http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/artists/zhang_xiaogang.htm
Inspired by family photos from the Cultural Revolution period, as well as the European tradition of surrealism, Zhang Xiaogang’s paintings engage with the notion of identity within the Chinese culture of collectivism. Basing his work around the concept of ‘family’ –immediate, extended, and societal – Xiaogang’s portraits depict an endless genealogy of imagined forebears and progenitors, each unnervingly similar and distinguished by minute difference.
Often painted in black and white, Xiaogang’s portraits translate the language of photography into paint. Drawing from the generic quality of formal photo studio poses and greyscale palette, Xiaogang’s figures are nameless and timeless: a series of individual histories represented within the strict confines of formula. The occasional splotches of colour which interrupt his images create aberrant demarcations, reminiscent of birth marks, aged film, social stigma, or a lingering sense of the sitter’s self assertion.
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Galleries Expand in Uncertain Market Art Around Town (New York)
By KATE TAYLOR - August 27, 2007
The art market may be heading for a correction, but you wouldn't know it from the number of existing galleries expanding and new galleries opening around town this fall.
On October 4, Marlborough Chelsea will open a 10,000-square-foot space on the first two floors of the new Chelsea Arts Tower at 545 W. 25th St. The gallery was previously located in a considerably smaller space on West 19th Street. With 15-foot ceilings on the first floor, the new space will allow the gallery to show monumental sculpture. |
Abstract Confusionism
by Alexandra Peers novembre 2007 Issue
It’s not just the crazy prices that make this art-market moment so intriguing. It’s that no one has a clue about the “real” value of a work.
The billion-dollar market for art and antiques is in a period of distinct uncertainty right now—described by New York appraiser Victor Wiener as “shifting sands”—following a long series of record-setting auctions. Sales at Sotheby’s and Christie’s International for the year’s auction season, which traditionally ends in July, totaled $6.2 billion, up from $4.3 billion the previous year. Collecting art has recently achieved a breadth of social cachet and popular interest not seen in the past half-century. |
