Chinese Works of Art

The renewed fashion for ancient bronzes during the Qing period reflected a confluence of scholarly interest, artistic expression and political strategy.

A selection of exhibitions taking place in the capital including the latest show at Chris Beetles

Seven international phone bidders competed a blue and white porcelain vase to nearly 1000 times its high estimate at Hansons (25.5% buyer’s premium) in Etwall, Derbyshire on October 9.

Christie’s is holding a Chinese works of art sale in London this autumn – its first for five years. The online auction titled Art of Asia, including the Palmer Family Collection closes on November 12.

A selection of upcoming auction highlights

Asian works of art specialist Alastair Gibson has recently completed the sale by private treaty of a set of Qianlong gouache scenes depicting tea cultivation and production.

A recent sale at The Cotswold Auction Company (24% buyer’s premium) in Cirencester included three famille rose porcelain abstinence plaques.

Invoice reveals the original deal for a Kangxi bowl that emerged from a London private collection

An exhibition at the Spode Museum devoted to the near-ubiquitous Willow pattern is bringing together two world cities bound by a unique shared heritage

It was announced on September 6 that the University of Staffordshire has partnered with Stoke-on-Trent City Council to house the Thornhill collection of predominantly Chinese ceramics at the Potteries Museum & Art Gallery in Hanley, with the aim of exhibiting it to the public for the first time since the 1980s.

That Willow became the most popular and persistent of the many transfer-printed landscape patterns was in part due to a stroke of 19th century marketing genius.

The long journey through private collections, auctions and dealerships taken by a William Burges (1827-81) jade bowl has ended at a museum and art gallery in Bedford, it has emerged.

A pair of mid 19th century Chinese export paintings of Macao hammered for Can$65,000 (£35,065) at AH Wilkens (22% buyer’s premium) in Toronto, Canada.

This unusually large giltwood figure of Guanyin, the Chinese goddess of compassion and mercy, attracted numerous bidders to Nagel’s (24.5% buyer’s premium) sale of Asian art on June 6-7 in Stuttgart.

Auctions like this don’t come along often these days.

Guided at $60,000-80,000, a Yixing stoneware ‘aubergine’ cup was the breakout star of Freeman’s Hindman (26% buyer’s premium) Asian Works of Art sale in New York, held during the Spring 2025 Asia Week.