First, China condemned the auction for harming Chinese people’s feelings and asked for their return. 80 Chinese lawyers even volunteered to start legal proceeding to stop the auction. However, the result was not as the China had expected. The court in France rejected the appeal from Chinese lawyers. And the two sculptures went to auction and sold for 14,000,000 Euros each on April 25th.
China was pretty angry at this result. The State Administration of Cultural Heritage in China made a strong statement quickly after the auction, criticizing Christie’s for putting up cultural relics transported abroad illegally for auction. It also declared a strict supervision over the entry and exit cultural relics via Christie’s agency in China.
I have been paying attention to this auction right from the start, and expected the two sides would work out a better solution. Although the result was not surprising, I am pretty disappointed.
First of all, China has the absolute ownership of the two sculptures, since they were looted during France's invasion. And according to the international treaty in 1995 that all the missing historical relics should go home without time limitation, theoretically, the two sculptures should be returned to China without any condition. China did a good job in taking the lead in handling this affair in accordance with the international agreement, so did the Chinese lawyers. But the question is France is not a signatory of this agreement. In addition, many European countries did not sign in this treaty. This means the legally binding force of the treaty is diminished greatly and limitlessly.
Another question is the current owner legally possessed the two sculptures. How to compensate the current owner is also a question. Christie’s revealed that the owner would like to give China the priority to buy the sculptures at a relatively lower price, but refused. Obviously, it is a big shame for China to buy his own property back. But besides this factor, it is not wise for China to do so since the price probably unbearable. Take these Chinese zodiac heads in international auction market for example. The total auction price for the cow's head, tiger's head, and monkey's head was 4,824,279.13 US dollars in 2000; the horse's head solely was 8,840,000 US dollars in 2007; and the total price of the rabbit’s head and rat’s head was estimated to be 1,800,000 Euros (23,249,806.25 US dollars). Therefore, even though the current owner offer China the priority, it's still a blackmail.
The most ironic thing in this event was the owner’s condition for returning the sculptures. He required that Chinese government let Dalai Lama go back to China and give Tibet freedom. When reading this news, I was provoked to anger. It is not that the owner does not have the right to gossip, but on this occasion? I would rather him to say no for his legal ownership, because at least he would win my respect for his upholding the authority of the French law. Even though it is not stable either, because the two sculptures were looted in the first place. But attaching that unreliable political condition to the sculptures on purpose only shows his unwillingness to return them. I don't believe he cares about Tibetans more than Chinese people, and I don't believe this condition would do even a little bit good to ease the tension between the Mainland and Tibet, and I don't believe his words would please even part of the Tibetans, because just like one of my friends' Tibetan friend said, if Tibet wants to become independent, it is the business of the Tibetans, but never the outsiders.
It turned out the story does not end. At a press conference on March 2nd, Cai Mingchao, a collector from Xiamen in China, admitted to be the purchaser of the two artifacts in Paris, but he decided not to pay for them. He claimed his purpose was just to take the responsibility as Chinese. Cai becomes famous in China. Some people call him a national hero, but others criticize his moral value.
This unexpected result is way out Chinese people's imagination. All of a sudden, the voice of criticizing Christie tailed down, and everyone is asking this question: do you need to become a bad guy for some good purpose? An online survey showed that more than 70 percent of Chinese people expressed their approval to his enthusiastic man, but also more than 20 percent people considered his action shamed Chinese people just as the Christie's did.
I cannot stop thinking whether it is worth taking such action. Besides the legal consequence he will face, the ethic issue concerns me as well. And another question is whether it is a good way to discourage those auction companies to back up such auctions. Obviously, the extensive media courage push this auction to be the most successful and profitable pageant by now.
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