Auction of Estella Collection draws artists' indignation
By David Barboza
Published: May 9, 2008
http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/05/08/arts/estella.php
SHANGHAI: Sotheby's auction house called it the "most important
collection of contemporary Chinese art to ever come to market" - some
200 works by some of China's hottest names.
And when the first half of the trove, called the Estella Collection,
went on the block in April in Hong Kong, it brought in $18 million and
set some record prices for artists, like $6 million for a canvas by
the Chinese painter Zhang Xiaogang.
But the sale of the works has stirred indignation among many of the
artists and their dealers and some curators.
Those artists and curators say that as the collection was being
formed, they were duped into thinking that a rich Westerner was
putting together a permanent collection and would eventually donate
some of the works to leading museums.
Instead, they say, the buyers were a group of investors who quickly
cashed in by selling the works last August to the Manhattan dealer
William Acquavella, who is in turn selling them through Sotheby's.
(The second half of the collection is to be auctioned this autumn in
New York.)
Some of the artists say they sold works in the Estella Collection at a
discount in the belief that the collection would gain long-term renown
and help enhance their reputations.
"I feel cheated," said one of the artists, Feng Zhengjie, 40, known
for his gaudy portraits of fashionable, lushly made-up women. "I can't
believe it ended up like that, just for an auction."
Michael Goedhuis, the New York dealer who formed the collection for
the group of investors, said he never misled anyone and had expected
his investors to hold on to the works.
"The story was the same to everyone: This is a collection we intend on
keeping intact," said Goedhuis, who traveled to China for more than
three years to collect the pieces. "There was a change of direction
for various reasons. It was a big surprise and it was out of my
control."
Goedhuis declined to identify his investors, but The New York Times
has already named two: Ray Debbane, president of the New York
investment firm Invus Financial Advisors, and Sacha Lainovic, a
co-founder and managing partner at Invus. Neither Debbane nor Lainovic
returned telephone calls seeking comment.
Goedhuis said that in any case the artists had no reason to complain
because they had benefited from the exposure. "They're riding the
wave," he said.
In a statement issued last week, Sotheby's acknowledged that in the
final weeks before the sale it "became aware that a few artists had
sold their works with a different expectation about what would happen
to them in the future." It said it hoped "the international exposure
during this exciting time in the market would be helpful in furthering
their careers."
Aggravating the controversy, the auction was announced just after the
works had been exhibited at the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art in
Humlebaek, Denmark, from March to August of last year. Had they known
the Estella Collection would quickly be sold, officials at the Danish
museum said, they would never have organized the exhibition.
"We seriously regret that it turned out to be mere speculation, and
there was dishonesty," said Anders Kold, the curator of the show,
titled "Made in China." "We didn't have that information, and so as a
consequence, we went on with it."
To retain the public trust and ensure that they are not used as
marketing tools, museums generally try to avoid exhibiting private
collections that are soon to be sold.
The show also traveled to the Israel Museum in Jerusalem, closing
there shortly before the April auction in Hong Kong.
The conflict suggests the tensions that have arisen between artists,
curators, galleries and museums around the world since the booming art
market became global. The challenges are particularly acute when it
comes to China, which has become a magnet for some of the world's
biggest galleries, museums, collectors and art market speculators, but
is relatively new to the game.
Chinese artists who a few years ago were selling works for just
$10,000 each are suddenly signing deals with international galleries
and seeing their works fetch $500,000 or more at auction. Indeed, Art
Market Trends 2007 reported that last year, five of the 10
best-selling living artists at auction were born in China, led by
Zhang, 50, whose works sold for a total of $56.8 million at auction
last year.
"It's amazing," said Fabien Fryns, a founder of F2 Gallery in Beijing.
"I think there'll be a $20 million painting sometime soon."
Goedhuis, a former antiques dealer, said that the sale last August to
Acquavella was hugely profitable for his investors. But he declined to
say what they paid for the works or what they sold them for. Art
market experts have put the Acquavella acquisition at around $25
million.
Sotheby's is a stakeholder in the Estella Collection auction. That the
first half of the collection has sold for far above the estimate
suggests that Acquavella and the auction house have invested wisely.
Goedhuis said his investors' "original concept" was to "build the
pre-eminent collection of Chinese contemporary art as the basis of a
great book."
One indication of the seriousness of the project, he said, was a
decision to hire Britta Erickson, an independent scholar and a leading
authority on Chinese contemporary art, to help select works and write
essays for the book, "China Onward," which was published by the
Louisiana Museum in Denmark.
But Erickson now says that she, too, was misled into thinking she was
working for a serious, long-term collector.
"I believed that it was to be a personal collection being assembled
for the long term, with perhaps some pieces to be donated to museums,"
she said in an e-mail message. "I am sorry I was misinformed."
She added, "The art world cannot function without trust."
The artist He Sen, 40, who paints photographlike images of young
women, also said that Goedhuis had assured him that a long-term
collector was behind the Estella Collection and that some of the works
might end up in a museum.
He said that one painting that he had sold to the collection for about
$60,000 went for more than $200,000 at the Hong Kong auction.
"Many artists, including me, were convinced by him, gave our best
works to Michael, some even at a relatively cheap price," he said of
Goedhuis. "Then it turned out to be an auction. We feel sold out by
him."
Feng said his works were auctioned at Sotheby's for five to 10 times
the price he gave Goedhuis.
Goedhuis said that in turning to Acquavella, he had hoped that the Las
Vegas casino tycoon Steve Wynn, a major collector with interests in
Macao, one of China's special administrative regions, would emerge as
a buyer of the entire collection. In the end Acquavella bought it
himself, without restrictions. Then he put it up for auction.
"That's what I do," Acquavella said. "I buy and sell."
Goedhuis said he had since tried to convince the artists that the
Estella Collection's brief history was a boon to them.
" 'You only benefited from this,' " he said he told some of the
artists after the auction was announced last autumn and he began
fielding complaints. " 'You're in a wonderful scholarly book and
you've been exhibited in two fine museums.' "
He also offered his own scathing critique of the artists, remarking
that they had profited so much from the boom that they could afford to
build huge studios and homes.
"The problem is everyone is buying and flipping, and the artists are
also flipping," he said by telephone from Beijing. "It's a Wild West
out here."
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