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“Grand panneau de chine” Yves Henry, Mixed Media, 145x114cm

My April through to June schedule will be booked with visits and interviews of European contemporary artists. Here are three exhibits by European artists with Oriental influences.

“Le monde comme volonté de représentation” Nathalie GAUL KAISU, Oil, 100x100cm

“Geisha dans les bambous” Odile VAN DEN WOLDENBERG, Oil, 75x35cm

The artists can be found in the links mentioned hereunder.

==> ART CONTEMPORAIN @www.art-contemporain.com
==> ART POUR TOUS @www.galerie-net.com

I was contacted by the Brussels Ancient Art Fair (BAAF) organizers to cover their event when they were preparing to celebrate their third year exhibition between 8th to 12th June 2005 last year in Brussels, Belgium. It is always a pleasure for me to receive their catalogues and to learn the stories connected to the pieces on exhibit and how they survived through the centuries to eventually find themselves carefully and always, lovingly handled and displayed by knowledgeable and very charming and friendly story-telling gallery owners and antique dealers.

Exhibiting Antiques Dealers from the Brussels Ancient Art Fair (BAAF) in Belgium:

Exhibiting at: GALERIE PIERRE HALLET, Rue Ernest Allard 33, Brussels, Belgium
Krater Greek, Attic, Circa 460 B.C., Terracotta, Height: 45cm

HARMAKHIS ARCHEOLOGIE, Jacques Billen, Rue des Minimes 17, B1000 Brussels, Belgium
Kneeling pharoah, Egypt, Late Period, Bronze, Height: 14.5cm

This year, this young but important Antiques exhibition event will take place 9th to 15th June 2006, again in the Sablon in Brussels, and like the year before, BAAF which focuses on European antiques, will be held together with the Brussels Oriental Art Fair (BOAF), the exhibition focusing on Asian and Oriental antiques, and the Brussels International Non-European Art Fair (BRUNEAF) on mainly African and Middle Eastern antiques. The three exhibitions are otherwise known as the “3Bs” – now that’s easy to remember. 3Bs in Brussels.

I have to state something here clearly for Asian collectors to understand since we’re on the topic of antiques as most times it is not often relayed and understood by collectors in Asia the standards the Europeans adhere to when exhibiting and putting antique pieces up for public or private sale.

Exhibiting Antiques Dealers from the Brussels Oriental Art Fair (BOAF) in Belgium:

(©Roger Asselberghs), GEORGIA CHRISCHILLES, Rue Mignot Delstanche 17, B1050 Brussels, Belgium
Head of Bodhisattva Terracotta, Ushkur-Type, Kashmir, 6th/7th century CE, Height: 24 cm

Exhibiting at: GALERIE PATRICK DEROM, Rue aux Laines 1, B1000 Brussels, Belgium
Seated on a lion, the crowned king of the Yaksha bears the attributes of a wealth-bestowing deity: a jewelled sceptre and a jewel-spewing mongoose. Vaisravana, Tibet ca. 1300, Brass, Height: 15cm

The following is a list I’ve extracted for everyone’s general knowledge, of the CODE OF ETHICS & PRACTICE put out by the International Association of Dealers in Ancient Art (IADAA).

Those in Thailand and Hong Kong who wish to sell pieces they acquire through dubious means from Angkor Wat or China’s excavation sites, should take note and understand what international collectors expect of pieces offered to them from Asia.

CODE OF ETHICS & PRACTICE
1. The members of the IADAA undertake to the best of their ability to make their purchases in good faith.

2. The members of the IADAA undertake not to purchase or sell objects until they have established to the best of their ability that such objects were not stolen from excavations, architectural monuments, public institutions or private property.

3. The members of the IADAA will not dismember and sell separately parts of one complete object.

4. The members of the IADAA undertake to the best of their ability to keep objects together that were originally meant to be kept together.

5. The members of the IADAA undertake to the best of their ability to keep photographic records prior to repair and restoration, to be honest and open by describing in writing the amount of repair or restoration undertaken to a prospective purchaser.

6. Members guarantee the authenticity of all objects they offer for sale.

7. The members of the IADAA undertake to the best of their ability to inform the Administrative Board about stolen goods and thefts. They also undertake to co-operate with international and national agencies involved in the recovery of stolen goods. The Administrative Board will take the appropriate action.

8. All members undertake to check objects with a purchase value of Euro 3,000 or over (or local currency equivalent) with the Art Loss Register unless the item has already been checked.

9. IADAA condemns the illegal use of metal detectors.

Exhibiting Antiques Dealers from the Brussels International Non-European Art Fair (BRUNEAF) in Belgium:CÉDRIC LE DAUPHIN, 25 rue Lebeau, B1000 Brussels, Belgium
Zhi en bronze partiellement laqué, incrusté de malachite et de fils d’or Royaumes Combattants 5ème siècle avant notre ère

GALERIE MALICHIN, 38 Lichtentaler Strasse, D76530 Baden-Baden, Germany
Mask Kou, Burkina Faso Wood, Height: 65 cm

The last time I covered Salon du Collectionneur in the Carrousel du Louvre in Paris, I asked over 30 gallery owners and antique dealers individually, in a 30-minute interview, what they would do if they were offered what they suspected to be stolen pieces from the Iraqi museums after they were despicably and shamelessly plundered during the commencement of the Iraqi War. All stated emphatically that any offer of antiques for sale to them would not be accepted on a “no questions asked” basis. They think it is highly unethical of people to deal in stolen property, especially one with a heritage value.

It brings to my mind a renown Portuguese/Chinese barrister I know and worked with in The Landmark in Hong Kong years ago, who was obsessed with Asian antiques, particularly Chinese ones. One day, a nondescript woman came to see him (I actually thought she was a cleaning lady) and he told me later that she had hidden in her coat, a particular piece she had acquired from China.

I asked him if he bought the piece from her, and he said yes, he did. He said it was ridiculous and stupid to pay the money Christie’s and Sotheby’s charged for those pieces as he knew there was a system and formula for manipulating the selling price to collectors and he would rather buy from people like that woman as she charged a far more reasonable price. (I’ll explain later in another article how Christie’s and Sotheby’s operate when they prepare items for auction and how you can understand the investment value and obtain an evaluation of your collection.)

I asked him how the woman acquired the piece and if it was authentic, and he answered he didn’t bother to ask how she came to have it, but base on “his knowledge and intuition” (which I highly questioned), he felt it was authentic, thus the exchange of money and item. Mind you, I did say earlier that he was in the “legal profession” and of all areas, he was considered one of the experts in the field of Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) protection. What does that reveal to you?

Along Hollywood Road, the Antiques area in Central, Hong Kong, if you walk away from the areas where the pubs, clubs and trendy micro restaurants are located and go inward along the main road, then turn right along any street, you’ll come across the “antiques” shops that prepare antique Chinese furniture for tourists. They know that tourist look for “aging” evidences in the antiques, but what the tourists don’t know is that new wood cut, prepared and put together replicating old period Chinese rigid high back chairs are buried for some time under moist earth and left there until they’re “aged, baked and ready” to pass off as the real thing – that is, as antiques. After all, they have been “buried”, they looked “old and rotting”, and they’re of the design of a historical period in China. … Riiiggght.

Unless one is an expert with years of experience microscopically examining details on hundreds of various antiques training one’s eye constantly on what to notice and observe with a team of other experts, not just magazine browsing or gallery hopping, or even collecting a few or tens of pieces, it will never be easy for one to discern the real from the fake.

Fake Rolex, Cartier, Vacheron Constantin watches these days pass for the real thing easily – the workmanship can be so perfect even a watch shop owner in the business for over two decades and used to handling and examining real and fake watches can be fooled , and I have been told this many times by the professionals themselves. How will you be able to tell unless you’re either told, or you start the process of dismantling the piece?

It really boils down to how one is brought up and how one is educated, and what exposure and understanding one has when it comes to being approached by people with goods of value but dubious origin and being persuaded to buy from them. In Milan, there is a street that is located close to a market-place (I’ve deliberately left out the names and details here as I’m not encouraging anyone to go to these places … I hope you get the hint there) … and it is reputed to contain stalls selling stolen goods passed to the hawkers from thieves who do their rounds of robbery through the Italian “high-class” district and residential homes.

You know what? That street overflows regularly with women and some men who go there to select and buy what’s on sale and offer, even in full comprehension that they could be buying stolen goods.

Again, as I mentioned earlier, it is how one is brought up, the education received, and the moral value and ethic one upholds as a person that will determine if you’ll respect certain concerns over “stolen property” – be they contemporary or antique pieces.

I see people who contemplate or even acquire fakes or stolen goods as people with limited education and exposure. I do believe once they know and they understand fully, they will cease to patronize the sale of fake or stolen pieces. The mere fact that this goes on just goes to show education is lacking and it’s not difficult to understand why. Asia does not have a system to enable higher education easily, so most children and young adult are swept into labour and work at an early age. They then grow without full understanding of some important things related to international exchange, or even the value of certain things, like copyright protected creations, unless they’re told about them and clear simple explanations are given.

So it’s really our duty, those of us who understand and care, to be patient and explain what has to be respected. And educating people on this is a continuous process – it should never stop – not if you truly care.

==> Brussels Ancient Art Fair @www.baaf.be
==> Brussels Non-European Art Fair @www.bruneaf.com
==> Brussels Oriental Art Fair @www.boafair.be
==> IADAA @www.iadaa.org