Art Market Monitor

Global Coverage ~ Unique Analysis

  • AMMpro
  • AMM Fantasy Collecting Game
  • Podcast
  • Contact Us

Amid Bribes and Payoffs, Legitimate Chinese Art Market Hard to Measure

January 20, 2014 by Marion Maneker

Chinese Art Auction

The South China Morning Post recaps what is already a well-known feature of the Chinese art market, that it is a convenient venue for offering bribes because Chinese auction houses take no responsibility for a work’s authenticity. However, it would be a step forward if we could begin to quantify how much of the Chinese art market is a conduit for illegal activity and how much is legitimate sales:

“The price of Chinese art is really abnormal,” Jiang Yinfeng, a painter and art critic told the Worker’s Daily. “Art has become the best tool for money laundering and corruption.”

China’s gift-giving culture drives up prices. Demand is driven by businessmen buying artefacts as presents for officials. Fake or genuine, an artwork presents an opportunity to ‘wash’ a bribe, WIC explains. A businessman gives a painting to an official, whose relative auctions it off. The businessman buys it back at an inflated price and the official pockets the cash. This leaves less evidence linking favour to bribe than handing over suitcases of cash. More sophisticated schemes exist but this is the general idea.

It goes without saying that a clampdown on dodgy art deals will hit all players in the business, but no one really knows how much is real.

China art auctions – a great money laundry (South China Morning Post)

More from Art Market Monitor

  • Christie’s Paris Art Contemporain = €18.4mChristie’s Paris Art Contemporain = €18.4m
  • Sotheby’s Solid Irish Sale Revives Hopes for Category GrowthSotheby’s Solid Irish Sale Revives Hopes for Category Growth
  • With Contemporary Art at the Top of the Social Pyramid, Does the Met Suffer from Donor Envy? With Contemporary Art at the Top of the Social Pyramid, Does the Met Suffer from Donor Envy? 
  • Brave European Curators Make Venice an Art FairBrave European Curators Make Venice an Art Fair
  • Crowded House @ Phillips de PuryCrowded House @ Phillips de Pury
  • Is This Contemporary Market Sustainable? Possibly, YesIs This Contemporary Market Sustainable? Possibly, Yes

Filed Under: Emerging Markets

About Marion Maneker

Want to get Art Market Monitor‘s posts sent to you in our email? Sign up below by clicking on the Subscribe button.

Top Posts

  • Keith Haring’s 1989 Retrospect Comes to Sotheby’s London Prints Sale
  • British Modernists Draw Deep Bidding in Christie's $42 M. London Sales
  • Four of Picasso's Women Valued at $28m Come to Christie's from Rose-Walters Collection
  • How to Chant Like an Auctioneer
  • Tony Podesta's Secret Art Buying
  • Norman Rockwell's Not Gay. But Is He a Great Artist?
  • $10 M. Picasso Portrait Unseen for Decades to Sell at Bonhams
  • Vienna Secession Painting, Long Thought to Be Lost, Sets a Record at Auction
  • Collection of Texas Heiress Anne Marion Expected to Fetch $150 M. at Sotheby’s
  • Following Legal Dispute, Restituted Pissarro Recovered From Toll Collection To Sell at Auction
  • About Us/ Contact
  • Podcast
  • AMMpro
  • Newsletter
  • FAQ

twitterfacebooksoundcloud
Privacy Policy
Terms & Conditions
California Privacy Rights
Do Not Sell My Personal Information
Advertise on Art Market Monitor