As global appeal of Chinese artworks loses lustre, can domestic collectors reframe the industry?
- After years of riding a wave of worldwide interest in Chinese paintings, artefacts and other pieces, domestic dealers lament lack of enthusiasm after the pandemic
- Geopolitical complications – especially China’s tensions with the US-led West – seem to have hit the once-booming overseas enthusiasm for Chinese art
Though many welcomed China’s reopening after three years of pandemic restrictions, art trader Chiang Lim-che’s disappointment was palpable – not over the relaxing of protocols, but at the muted, almost nonexistent reception from overseas buyers as a host of Chinese pieces became newly available.
The dealer, from Hong Kong, was framing the situation as a means of rekindling interest for his wares, but years of momentum that moulded Western interest in Chinese art collections began to crack as the country painted itself into a corner with stringent zero-Covid measures and brushed off a decline in trade relationships.
To adapt, Chiang has recast his attention inward, and burgeoning interest from the younger generation of Chinese collectors now comes as music to his ears.
Top artworks by established Chinese artists are still sought-after by high-net-worth individuals, but Western collectors’ appetite for other Chinese art has quickly faded, Chiang observed.
“Geopolitical complications – especially China’s tensions with the US-led West – seem to have hit the once-booming overseas enthusiasm for Chinese art,” said Chiang, who has decades of experience in the art business.
Across the border from Hong Kong in Guangdong province, Chiang runs a large storage house in Guangzhou’s Nansha district that spans more than 20,000 square metres. It’s filled with tens of thousands of pieces of traditional Chinese furniture that he has amassed from home and abroad.
He points to sets of “eight immortals” – traditional tables that seat eight and can cost thousands of dollars – along with an assortment of sandalwood desks, closets, lampstands and various wood carvings.
The pandemic essentially iced his exports, but what has transpired since borders reopened also has not boded well for business.
“More worryingly,” he explained, “is that demand among Western consumers is still frozen in a post-pandemic chill.”
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Chinese artists also lament the lack of overseas interest that was once considerable. One painter, who lives in the Netherlands, echoed Chiang’s assessment.
“I’ve been living in Europe for more than 30 years,” she said, declining to be named because of her close ties to the European art world. “I feel that the relationship between China and here has changed dramatically in recent years, and this has profoundly affected the Chinese art and collection business – especially among those Chinese artists who made a name for themselves in the Western market in the 2010s. There had been quite a few people collecting their artworks in Europe, and the value of these paintings is now deprecated quite a lot.”
It has also become extremely difficult for Chinese artists to hold exhibitions in galleries and museums in Europe, she added.
She attributed the shift to worsening ideological tensions between China and the West. “As artists, we feel very regrettable [about what’s happening], and we are really struggling, but the situation may continue for a while,” she said.
China’s art market continued to cool in 2022 amid unabating Covid controls as much of the world had already reopened for business. Sales were down 14 per cent, year on year, and China was overtaken by Britain as the world’s second-largest market by market share, according to a report by Art Basel and UBS last year.
But wealthy mainland collectors have resumed splashing out on art since last year after China removed Covid control restrictions and reopened its border at the end of 2022, and they showed a strong return to post-lockdown spending, according to the report.
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Looking ahead to the rest of this year, some of the most active buying plans were reported by collectors from mainland China, the report added.
Meanwhile, Chiang is pinning hopes on rising interest in Chinese culture, heritage and domestic brands among the younger generation of China’s middle class. He expects that they could boost China’s art market and offset the shrinking overseas demand.
“Enthusiasm for the traditional Chinese culture is rising among the Chinese young middle class, especially with the popularity of self-focused consumption among Gen Z women.
“An ‘eight immortals’ table and a wardrobe made in the late Qing dynasty [1644-1911] … priced at a few thousand yuan, can be converted into a coffee table or a room door, which can integrate them into young people’s lives,” he said.
Despite the economic downturn, we have more spending power for art and collecting compared with our parents’ generation
Ted Fang, who is interested in original designs and the trading of second-hand collectibles, said the waning interest among overseas collectors could also serve as an opportunity for Chinese people to buy back cultural relics and artworks lost overseas, at relatively affordable prices.
“Despite the economic downturn, we have more spending power for art and collecting compared with our parents’ generation,” said Fang, who is in his thirties and lives in Guangzhou.
“Modifying classical furniture is very personalised and environmentally friendly, and many Chinese young people can try it, and maybe turn it into a new fashion statement,” he said.
“In the past, like in the ’90s, modifying a piece of furniture produced more than 100 years ago cost thousands of yuan,” Fang said. “Of course, it was a hobby that was out of reach for Chinese people who had a monthly income of only a few hundred yuan at that time. But now might be just the right time.”
