Bloomberg covers Christie’s sales in depth finding weakness in the market for antiquities but Contemporary Asian art is still hot:

“Prices of Chinese contemporary artworks, especially those that contain the five elements: talent, humor, politics, color and `Chineseness,’ will continue to rise,” said Roderic Steinkamp, a New York-based dealer, in a May 26 interview. “We also have to watch out for the emergence of other Asian works.”

What to look out for next? Indonesian painters.

The Washington Post wraps up Christie’s week of sales in Hong Kong with this analysis:

For more traditional categories of Chinese artwork however, such as imperial ceramics and modern and classical paintings, results were far more modest, suggesting more restrained bidding from Chinese buyers, who have aggressively driven up valuations in recent years. . . . There have been other signs of strain in the frothy Chinese art market amid continued financial market turmoil. . . . An index run by Chinese art website Artron (www.artron.net), which tracks the works of 18 “red-hot” Chinese contemporary artists, has dropped 4.1 percent in the first quarter this year after almost doubling in 2007.

Bloomberg interviews Sender Collection curator Todd Levin in advance of Art Basel 39. Among the number of comments taken from what was surely a longer conversation, Levin makes this observation about Chinese contemporary art:

“The broad majority of Chinese contemporary art is so bad I didn’t feel the need to get involved,” said Levin. “I could see there was a money play to be made there, but that’s not the main reason why we’re putting together a collection.’

Bonus Link: Artdaily explores the upcoming Cincinnati Chinese Design show slated for October of 2008.