“That’s good. Now you can begin to work on good health.” That was no doubt true, but Burton himself wasn’t looking quite as perky as he had been the last time I saw him. Too bad the auction wasn’t the day after we arrived, because I would be in better form than he.
“I plan to rest for the flight,” he said, indicating the sign at his seat. “But I look forward to seeing you in Beijing. Perhaps we’re going to the same place?”
“Perhaps we are,” I said.
“Your first visit to China, is it?” he said, sticking one earplug in, but holding the other for my reply.
“No, it isn’t,” I said. “Although it has been a number of years since I’ve been there.”
“You’ll find it changed,” he said.
It had changed all right. The truth of the matter is, if I hadn’t been told Beijing was the destination of my flight, I could safely have assumed, except for the racial homogeneity of the people, that I was in a large city almost anywhere. When I’d been there two decades previous, no one except high Communist Party officials were allowed to have cars, people all wore the same uniform, the so-called Mao jacket in either grey or navy, and while there were some high-rises to be seen, Beijing was still a city of little neighborhoods and thousands upon thousands of bicycles. I’d heard about China’s headlong rush to modernize, of course. Who hadn’t? But nothing prepared me for what I saw. Office towers loomed over expressways and wide avenues. The whole city seemed to be one large construction site. I kept looking for the neighborhoods, the hutongs or lanes, and the street markets that I had loved. I couldn’t see them.
And the cars! I had never seen anything like it anywhere in the world. I suppose, given that cars had only been allowed a few years before, that I was looking at an entire nation of new drivers. It was one of the scariest experiences I have ever had.
Burton hadn’t arranged for a limo and driver at the airport. We were, it seemed, staying at the same hotel, chosen I suppose for its proximity to the auction house, which made it difficult for me not to offer him a lift in the car Mira Tetford had sent for me. I was beginning to realize I was destined to spend way too much time with Burton, a thought only slightly less terrifying than the traffic.
Burton might worry excessively about his health, but the traffic didn’t seem to bother him. He chatted away amiably to a young woman by the name of Ruby who had accompanied the driver, and who introduced herself as Mira’s assistant. It was only as the Mercedes hurtled through a red light, narrowly missing a woman pedaling a three-wheeled cart loaded with persimmons across what was clearly a deadly intersection, and coming inches away from being’t-boned by a bus that was making an illegal left turn, that Burton reacted. “One has to wonder if they have to take a drivers’ test here or if they just buy a car and drive it off the lot,” he said in a disapproving tone.
“Of course we do,” Ruby said, giggling into her hand. “You are not the first foreign visitor to mention the driving. You will get used to it soon enough.”
“I don’t want to get used to it,” Burton said. “I just want to survive it. You’ll be happy to hear, Lara, that except under rather limited circumstances, foreigners are not allowed to drive in China.” I guess he thought I might still have germs, because he tried not to look at me even though he was addressing me. “A good thing, don’t you agree? Those of us who think traffic lights, turn signals, and lanes are a useful concept would be squashed like bugs within minutes of venturing forth.”
If the driving wasn’t to my liking, the hotel room certainly was. It was not all that large, but it had an absolutely spectacular view over the golden roofs of the Forbidden City, wave after wave of them, now glowing in the late afternoon sun. If I stood on tiptoe I could see the large plazas that separated the various palaces in the huge complex, and even pretend that the tourists flocking along the streets on either side or crossing Tian’anmen Square to the south were servants of the emperor, or perhaps foreign delegations paying their respects. It had been home to emperors, “forbidden” to almost everyone else. From this viewpoint, Beijing was absolutely enchanting.
Mira’s office was atop another tower, this one just a little east of the hotel, in the foreign embassy section of Beijing. After the usual pleasantries and a cup or two of Chinese tea the next day, we got down to business. Mira was maybe forty, and struck me as very competent in a quiet, unassuming way. She appeared to be fluent in Mandarin, although I was no judge on that subject, and she clearly knew what she was talking about. Joining us was her assistant Ruby, the young woman who had met me at the airport the previous day.
“I’ve done some research on the art auction scene here with Ruby’s help,” Mira began. “Let me digress a little to say how much I’m enjoying this. For some reason I’m finding it more interesting than yet another joint venture between Chinese and North American companies wanting to manufacture plastic widgets here. To summarize my findings: One, art auction houses are a new concept here in China. We don’t have the experience of, say, Hong Kong.
“Two: auction houses are supposed to be licensed by the Cultural Relics Bureau of China. My conclusion is that most are not. In other words, there are many more auction houses than licenses. Three: if you asked four people the number of licensed facilities here, you’d get four different answers, meaning it is difficult to tell which are licensed, and which are not. Four: this may be because Beijing Municipality also licenses auction houses. Its standards are reputedly lower than that of the CRB. Five: even licensed auction houses have, because of the infancy of the profession, no prior experience in art auctions. Six: there are probably only five auction houses in Beijing that are truly licensed by the Cultural Relics Bureau to conduct auctions, and seven: Cherished Treasures House is not one of them. So, in conclusion…”
“Caveat emptor,” I said.
“Caveat emptor, ”buyer beware,“ in spades,” she said. “The art market here on the Chinese mainland is pretty much unregulated. Under those circumstances, you cannot assume any appraisal is accurate…”
“Tell me how this is different from anywhere else. You can’t assume that at home, either. All kinds of stuff is labeled ‘as found.” In other words, no guarantees.“
“Of course. But at home you have reputable auction houses with expert staff…”
“That still doesn’t guarantee anything, I can assure you. Some top auction houses have been implicated in various scandals rocking the art and antiquities market. I’m not comparing established European and North American auction houses with the ones here, because I wouldn’t know, but I am saying that you should be careful anywhere.”
“I doubt you’ve seen anything like this. One quite reputable auction house here has been rocked by an allegation that it has been selling stolen paintings. They are contemporary paintings, and as it turns out, the artist is still very much alive and has accused the auction house of selling stolen work. Now, who knows what the real story is. I mean we don’t know who actually put the paintings up for auction because in China, as elsewhere, the auction house is obliged to protect the name of the seller and buyer if requested. But it does not inspire great confidence.
“As for Cherished Treasures House, it’s new in the field. In a sense, it came out of nowhere. I tried to find out who owns it and got the name of another corporation that I didn’t know either. Cherished Treasures House did, however, have an amazing inaugural auction a few months ago.
There was a small drawing by a Ming emperor for which they managed to fetch a rather breathtaking price, so it has established itself quite quickly. As for the T’ang silver box, I’ve been told by my partner Eva Reti that you know what it looks like, and that you should be able to identify a forgery if indeed that is what we have here.“