Chapter 1610 becomes a series
There is a story that particularly illustrates the keen vision of a businessman like him.
Wu Erlu, who graduated from the Art History Department of the Central Academy of Fine Arts and is an old classmate of Chen Danqing, will become an important promoter of the Chinese art market in the next twenty years. In 1983, he was still studying art history in the United States.
In 1986, he came to work at Ellsworth's house to help him sort out his collection of antiques. At that time, Ellsworth was not interested in collecting rare books and inscriptions. He would acquire Chinese books, paintings, and rubbings, except for inscriptions and inscriptions.
In 1987, Wu Erlu bought the rare inscription "Jin and Tang Xiaokai" at Sotheby's in New York for more than 10,000 US dollars. This price was half Wu Erlu's salary at the time. The price of calligraphy rubbings was so expensive. Wu Erlu's strong passion for rare books and inscriptions moved An Siyuan and aroused his curiosity.
Wu Erlu told Ellsworth that this was the old collection of Duan Fang, a great collector in the late Qing Dynasty, and gave Ellsworth an example - Luo Zhenyu, a famous Chinese collector in the late Qing Dynasty and the early Republic of China, sold his collection of cultural relics with a heavy bill. The "Stele of Liang Gong" sold for 2,000 yuan, and "The Preface to the Tuosheng Religion of the Song Dynasty" sold for 3,000 yuan. However, the paintings by Shen Zhou and Tang Yin in the list were only worth 200 to 300 yuan.
With this hint, Ellsworth, who is extremely perceptive, understood the mystery and the status of the inscriptions in the collection of Chinese art.
The next day, Ellsworth bought "Song Tuo, Jin and Tang Xiaokai" from Wu Erlu at double the price, and entrusted Wu Erlu to pay attention to the transaction of inscriptions. After that, under Wu Erlu's guidance, Ellsworth steadily became a Connoisseur of the largest collection of Western Chinese calligraphy inscriptions.
In just a few years, he already owned the Yuezhou Shi family's "Song Tu, Jin and Tang Xiaokai", eleven Song Tu "Huairen's Preface to the Holy Religion", Song Tu "Huai Su's Cursive Script" Thousand Characters "Wen", "Shui rubbings" "Xihe Inscription", Ming Dynasty "Tianfa Shen Prophecy Stele", Ming Dynasty "Liturgical Stele", unbroken edition "Cao Quan Stele", old rubbing "Shiguwen", Song Dynasty "Huangting Jing", "Tang Xiaozi Ma Xian Tan" "Notes" and other rare treasures on inscriptions.
There is also the "Chunhua Pavilion Tie", which was finally won by Li Qiyan with Zhou Zhi's help and donated to the country.
Stele calligraphy is a unique form of calligraphy in China, and the study of stele calligraphy is a discipline that integrates art, historical materials, documents, craftsmanship and bibliography. Due to its extremely strong professionalism, just like the meticulously studied exegesis and phonology of ancient characters, few people, whether at home or abroad, can delve into it to a profound level.
The big names in this field in China are generally proficient in calligraphy, and are also proficient in the history of calligraphy. For people who have studied calligraphers of all dynasties deeply, Mr. Qi can count them with one hand. Zhou Zhi gave After two years of improving my skills and improving my calligraphy skills, I am now only half-skilled.
However, An Siyuan knew nothing about the study of inscriptions, but because of the favorable location, people, and good fortune, he was able to sit on the treasure mountain. He even said to Zhou Zhi with a smile: "I don't have many things that are not for sale, but you are the first The statue of Bodhisattva I saw last time The ones I bought when I was nineteen are definitely not for sale. The rest of the inscriptions like these will be sold one day..."
This attitude of treating priceless treasures as "rare things to live in" really makes Zhou Zhi speechless. But he had to be convinced.
Because no matter his fourth cousin, Mr. Wang or Mr. Qi, they all told him that this method of "playing for fun" is the highest level of collecting. There is no doubt that Ellsworth has reached the highest level of this highest level. It can almost be called the best in the world. In addition to inscriptions, Ming and Qing furniture is one of the highlights in An Siyuan's collection. In the 1950s and 1960s, when Chinese classical furniture, including huanghuali, was regarded by Westerners only as daily utensils and far from reaching the level of art collection, Ellsworth has evolved from its simple shape and lines, I see an implicit Rich in the beauty of Eastern philosophy, his mentor Pang Nai likes to cleverly arrange Chinese artworks in private homes, allowing celebrities and distinguished guests to "feel the charm of Eastern art without knowing it." This kind of sale and purchase does not leave any trace of business The elegance of the traces left an unforgettable impression on An Siyuan.
In order to decorate his apartment, he began to focus on Ming and Qing furniture that contained oriental aesthetics. Unlike collecting inscriptions, his attainments in this area have reached a true expert level, and can even be called He is the founder of the history of furniture collection and appreciation in the Ming and Qing Dynasties. He published three books including "Chinese Furniture: Examples of Chinese Hardwood Furniture in the Ming and Qing Dynasties". The earliest one was even fifteen years earlier than Mr. Wang's "Ming Style Furniture Appreciation". It greatly promoted the world's understanding of ancient Chinese furniture and even triggered a craze for collecting Ming and Qing furniture.
Posterity praised: "He and Mr. Wang are both Chinese and Western, and together they support the magnificent sky of Chinese art. If Mr. Wang is an erudite, profound and solemn master, Ellsworth He is a handsome, handsome and graceful scholar and swordsman."
The two of them can be regarded as the two pinnacles of research and collection of Ming-style furniture.
In addition, there are works by Eastern modern painters, such as Xu Beihong, Li Keran, Qi Baishi and others. The one with the largest collection is Shi Lu, a fellow from Zhou Zhixu.
In a short period of time, he formed a complete collection system of Shi Lu's works. At that time, the works of Xu Beihong, Qi Baishi and others were already relatively expensive, but the works of Shi Lu, a Xi'an painter with a majestic style and rich talent, were very cheap. So An Siyuan traveled to Xi'an many times, tried his best to search for it, and bought a large number of Shi Lu's paintings.
An Siyuan has never met Shi Lu in person, and many paintings were purchased from Shi Lu’s family. Low prices and high profits are the shrewdness of a businessman. His motto is: "Buy and sell thirty years later."
His business methods are full of knowledge and skills. Buying a person To build a collection, you need to buy all the works, keep the best one-third, and sell the remaining two-thirds. At this time, the remaining collections are almost costless, and when those collections are sold years later, what is obtained is a "net profit."
What Zhou Zhi is doing these days is to screen the works for Ellsworth’s auction. This time Ellsworth plans to auction off more than 250 Chinese paintings from the 20th century in his collection at one time. It includes many works by the above-mentioned people.
These works are hard to find outside today, but here at Ellsworth, they are actually on the sale list. Zhou Zhi estimates that for the few masterpieces left behind, each piece will exceed 10 million to 20 million yuan in ten years.
In addition, An Siyuan also wants to sell off another collection system this time, the Yaozhou kiln among Song porcelains.
Yaozhou kiln is a treasure in traditional Chinese porcelain making technology, one of the six major kiln series in the Song Dynasty. Huangbao Town is located in today's Tongchuan, Shaanxi Province. It was governed by Yaozhou during the Tang and Song Dynasties. It was a famous producing area for Chinese ceramics in the Tang Dynasty. It had a sister relationship with Qiong Kiln. In the Song Dynasty, Qiong Kiln began to decline, but Yaozhou Kiln further reached its peak. , was the most famous among the celadon kilns in the north during the Song Dynasty and was regarded as the leader.