In 2000, Weng Wange, a Chinese-American, transferred more than 80 kinds of books and 542 rare ancient books of the Song, Yuan, Ming, and Qing dynasties to the Shanghai Library at auction in exchange for 4.5 million US dollars.
Just when many people were talking about this matter, no one expected that at the end of 2018, Weng Wange actually donated 183 cultural relics worth more than 1 billion US dollars to the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, which also included the national treasure "Ten Thousand Miles of the Yangtze River Map".
As soon as the news came out, public opinion was immediately detonated, and everyone blamed Weng Wange's behavior. Why did Onwango donate precious artifacts to the United States? Why does the Weng family have so many cultural relics? How did these cultural relics end up overseas?
The reason why the Weng family has so many cultural relics is important because the two dynasties of the Weng family are "emperors" - Weng Tonggong.
Weng Tonggong, as the "Prime Minister", not only entered the military plane twice, served as the prime minister and minister of state affairs, but also loved to collect works of art, especially calligraphy classics.
In fact, the Weng family's collection of books began with Weng Tonggong's father, Weng Xincun, who was poor in his early years and used to work in the library, and also had a certain ability to appreciate the collection.
In addition, he himself has a strong interest in collecting, so during the Daoguang years, he has successively collected many bibliophiles' heirloom collections, which has also become the cornerstone of Weng's collection.
Influenced by Weng Xincun, Weng Tonggong is also very keen on collecting calligraphy and painting classics, and he is very researched in calligraphy, with the reputation of "the first in the world between the light", so many people will vote for it, send him some calligraphy masterpieces passed down from generation to generation, over time, Weng's collection of books has become more and more abundant, and gradually has the reputation of one of the nine major collections in the late Qing Dynasty.
And because Weng Tonggong had no heirs, after his death, the Weng collection was passed on to his brother's son Weng Chenghan, and it was through this way of passing it on from generation to generation that in 1920, Weng Xingang, who was only two years old, got this collection.
According to Weng Xincun's later recollections, he didn't understand anything at that time, and receiving this batch of books was "like a pie falling from the sky."
In 1938, the 20-year-old Weng Wange went to study at Purdue University in the United States, and successfully obtained a master's degree in mechanical and electrical engineering at the age of 22, but he did not rely on this degree to find a job, but went to the University of Wisconsin for further study in the Fine Arts Department, and has been engaged in painting, photography and film since then.
During his study abroad, Weng Wange also actively promoted Chinese culture to the West, and he also filmed dozens of educational films and documentaries that promoted Chinese culture.
This includes "Chinese Buddhism", which won a gold medal at the Atlanta International Film Festival in 1973, and from this point of view, Weng Wange has indeed made a certain contribution to promoting Chinese culture.
However, during his study abroad, because of the turbulent domestic situation and the war, weng wango was always worried about the collection at home, and in order to better protect these precious collections, he made a bold decision, that is, to pack and take all these collections away and transport them to the United States.
At that time, the products were transported from Tianjin to Shanghai, and then from Shanghai to the freighters bound for the United States, and finally successfully arrived at a warehouse in Manhattan, where they were preserved for 30 years, and after Weng Wange retired, he also specially built the famous Laixi Residence to protect these collections.
At that time, everyone in China thought that the Weng family's collection had been burned in the turmoil, but no one knew that Weng Wange used the method of "golden cicada shelling" to properly arrange the cultural relics.
Until 1985.
In 1985, at the "China Book Exhibition" held at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in the United States, weng's collection, which had been "disappearing" for nearly 40 years, suddenly appeared.
Therefore, at that time, the emergence of Weng's collection caused a huge sensation in the world, especially domestic scholars and collectors, who were even more happy that this collection could be preserved.
At the time of this exhibition, some scholars in our country happened to be in the United States, so they personally confirmed the authenticity of this collection of books.
After returning to China, they immediately reported these situations to the relevant departments of our country, hoping that the state could find a way to bring back this collection of books.
The relevant departments and collectors in our country also have this willingness, so everyone began to gradually contact Ongwango, ready to understand his attitude on this matter.
In 2000, Weng Wange sent more than 80 kinds of books collected by the family, accumulating 542 precious ancient books of the Song, Yuan, Ming, and Qing dynasties, to the auction, and the domestic side also successfully obtained the collection for 4.5 million US dollars, and finally placed them in the Shanghai Library.
Up to this time, the domestic evaluation of Wengwange is still relatively positive, in the eyes of most people at that time, Wengwango has already joined the United States citizenship, and the cultural relics can be counted as his private property.
But things changed dramatically on December 13, 2018.
At that time, the Boston Museum of Fine Arts publicly issued a statement indicating that they had received the largest number and most significant donations of Chinese paintings and calligraphy in history, and the donor was Weng Wange.
However, this batch of cultural relics, which originally belonged to China, was donated to museums in the United States.
As soon as this news was released, it stirred up thousands of waves, and many people with strong national consciousness began to rebuke Ongwango for being ungrateful and a traitor.
In particular, after the Boston Museum of Fine Arts showed that Onwango had donated art many times in the past few decades, the pressure on Public Opinion faced by Onwango reached its peak.
Many people have expressed their incomprehension, giving away the treasures that belong to Chinese culture to foreigners, can they really appreciate the preciousness of these cultural relics?
Regarding this question, Weng Wange has already given the answer in the "Examination of the Famous Traces of Chinese Calligraphy and Painting in the Original Collection of Gu Luofu".
"Museums are the best home for collectibles."
In Weng Wange's view, cultural relics or collections do not belong to a single person, the museum is the ultimate destination of these things, and only museums have the material conditions for collecting and protecting cultural relics, and only have the ability to spread the culture contained in these cultural relics.
Everyone can understand and accept this, but his other point of view is that many people cannot accept it.
He believes that culture has no borders, and the inheritance and continuation of civilization should not be divided by the boundaries of countries, in other words, cultural relics are the world's, everyone's, and it is the same for which museum to donate.
So Onwango believes that if this is the case, then why not donate cultural relics to the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, which has "better material conditions"?
In his view, there are a large number of national collections, and donating this collection can be conducive to the spread of Chinese culture.
Although we have to admit that for a long time in the past, china's protection of cultural relics was a certain lack, but there was both the impact of war and the limitations of technology at that time.
Therefore, at that time, many people chose to protect China's cultural relics in their own way, but this was by no means a reason to bring cultural relics belonging to China out of China and send them to museums in other countries, because China has never stopped protecting cultural relics.
For example, the batch of cultural relics in the Forbidden City, during the period when Peiping fell into turmoil during the revolutionary years, Chairman Mao's teacher Yi Peiji personally registered the cultural relics and transferred them to other parts of our country for protection, and when the Beiping turmoil ended, he took back this batch of cultural relics, and none of the cultural relics were lost or damaged in the whole process.
Now we not only have an attitude, but also we are constantly developing the technical conditions for the protection of cultural relics. In 2018, many museums in China have done a very good job in the preservation and repair of cultural relics, and if Onwango really wants to protect these cultural relics, he can send them back to China and let them be properly placed.
We believe that in the protection of cultural relics belonging to our country, the Chinese people will be more concerned than any foreigner, as for the promotion of Chinese culture, it is completely possible to lend these cultural relics out for exhibition, where is the need to donate?
Many people said that the reason why Onwango donated the cultural relics to the American Museum was to improve his social status and allow his children to enter the museum, whether this speculation is true, we will not comment, we can only say that we think that the cultural relics should have been better placed.
Of course, we can't know what Wengwango really thought at that time, although everyone has the right to choose freely, but when Wengwango said that he lived for the family collection, and the family collection also became his life, this can't help but make people wonder, since as an heir to the collection family, why not let these collections "fall leaves back to the roots"?
However, we always believe that the collection of cultural relics that have been lost overseas will eventually return to the motherland, and we also firmly believe that that day will not be too far away.
So what do you think of this behavior of Onwango?