Reviews: Auction

Oil online

Art collection was once considered a privilege of the nouveau riche in China, but now more people are craving that oil painting on the wall or a porcelain vase on top of the cabinet.

Thanks to the Internet, art is becoming more affordable. Among the mushrooming online art auction websites, www.artrade.com.cn, an affiliate of the China Guardian Art Auction Co Ltd, is one of the oldest and most reputed. Currently, it is holding a monthly sale with a display of more than 2,000 works of art priced between $100 and $5,000.

The highlights are oil paintings and prints by established contemporary artists. Zhu Dequn, professor at the Central Academy of Fine Arts, has 12 prints on sale with an average price of about $3,000. The most important one, titled Blue Waves, is an unusually vanguard piece of the artist known for his Realistic style.

Wu Yi'en, another Realistic artist, also has one of his masterpieces on sale, titled May of Tibet (pictured).

Wang Shanshan

(China Daily 03/27/2007 page20)