Chen Liangling, Vice President of Christie's Hong Kong, Senior Expert and Auction Director of China Porcelain and Art Department, is also a popular auctioneer on the Internet, with extensive auction experience, and also holds a license as an auctioneer in China and New York State. Born in Taiwan, she graduated from Cornell University in 2006 with a Bachelor of Biological Sciences degree and a Master's degree in Chinese Art History from Christie's College of Fine Arts in London.
Dress SHANGHAI TANG
Leather boots FENDI
On the surface, Chen Liangling is a particularly classical person. Obsessed with Chinese cultural relics since childhood, she volunteered at the National Palace Museum in Taipei for nearly a year in the year between colleges and universities. In the 12 years since she joined Christie's, she has made her research on Chinese porcelain and art her main business, and she loves to ponder porcelain, and her favorite artwork is the blue and white lotus pattern lid plum vase made during the Yongle period of the Ming Dynasty in the National Palace Museum in Taipei. In an art auction video widely circulated on social networks, she wore a satin cheongsam with inlaid buckles, stood on the auction stage, her face was plain makeup, smoothly switching between Chinese and English bilingual shouting, and between her hands and feet, she flashed a bit of oriental subtlety.
Chen Liangling, who left the auction stage, is like a heroine who escaped from the ancient book line-bound novel. She spoke wittily, almost twice as fast as ordinary people. As a master of controlling the field, she is keenly aware of the invisible and untouchable emotions that permeate the air, and from time to time throw jokes about the troubles of the early years and close the distance with the interlocutor. She said she is a typical Capricorn, who is efficient and rigorous in her work, only because she "does not want to waste the lives of others." In contrast to the gentleness on the auction stage, her particularly striking trait is crispness and neatness, without dragging mud and water, as is the simple geometric lines of her favorite artist, Wassily Kandinsky, who flutters in abstract paintings.
Black coat FENDI
Pleated top ISSEY MIYAKE
Light trousers SHANGHAI TANG
Before each auction, Chen Liangling will tie her long hair tightly and store it behind her head. She rarely wears earrings, afraid of clanging on the auction stage and colliding with microphones pinned to her ears. She was accompanied by a pen, an auction mallet by a British craftsman and a "Auctioneer's Book" that she had carefully marked with notes on the valuation and reserve price of the lot.
Three years ago, Chen Liangling hosted Christie's Hong Kong Spring Auction of "Ancient Chinese Paintings and Paintings and chenghuaitang Art Museum Collection", which was the first time she hosted the auction of calligraphy and painting collections as an expert in the China Porcelain and Art Department (hereinafter referred to as "Artifacts"), and the longest auction she has experienced. The auction lasted nearly four hours, with multiple sellers bidding fiercely for the lot, and the atmosphere was glued. In the huge auction hall, the distance from the auctioneer to the audience seat can reach about 20 meters, and there are more than 20 rows of spectators sitting between the seats, flanked by telephone commissions that keep in warm contact with online buyers at any time, as well as online synchronous bidding on the special big screen display, plus written commissions, the scene is full of people, and everyone will focus on Chen Liangling. She stared intently at the scene, seamlessly connecting Chinese and English bilingually, shouting prices for different lots, raising her arms from time to time to signal to her colleagues on the telephone table, occasionally not forgetting to ridicule, and making a harmless joke that could enliven the atmosphere.
The dramatic moment was only late for the Ming Dynasty calligrapher and painter Wen Zhengming's "Seven Words and Poems of xingshu" to appear. After the HK$5 million "Seven Words and Poems of the Book of Conduct" was auctioned from HK$3.8 million and the price exceeded HK$30 million, the two telephone buyers competed for each other in the competition. Looking back on that moment, Chen Liangling remembered vividly, "Two bidders competing with each other, like a game in progress, and I am the middleman." "In previous auctions, auctioneers would communicate with buyers through eye contact, signal-filled body language, and the curve of the voice. For bidders who are not present, the shaping of the voice is crucial. "Auctioneers need to make customers more enthusiastic through their voices and tones. On the phone, conveying my emotions to the guests is a fun process. At the beginning of the general auction, I will use a brisk and serious voice, and the words behind will use a longing tone, a softer voice, so that the other party will know through my voice that I am willing to take the time to wait for you, but also hope that you have a positive reply, rigid and soft. "The game between you and me was deadlocked for nearly 35 minutes, and in the end, the "Seven Words and Poems of the Book of Conduct" was auctioned at 16 times higher than the estimated price, and it fell at HK$83.22 million.
In the interview, Chen Liangling maintained her usual humility, bluntly saying that the final actual transaction price of a collection could not be attributed to the auctioneer, which was not the success of her impromptu performance alone, but the common efforts of invisible department experts - from collection requisition, editing catalogues to auction previews, contacting buyers, marketing packaging, etc., the seemingly dramatic auction is just an embellishment for the collection.
She values respect and fairness, and the brightest person at the auction said, "Respect and fairness are the most important traits in an auctioneer." Sometimes, a lot is sold in a minute or two, and behind the short time is the painstaking efforts of countless people. Before each auction, I keep my mind on the idea that I'm going to get the best out of the lot, and I don't think about whether I'm going to look good on the auction stage. As for fairness, there must be no possibility of me waiting for this guest for two minutes, urging the guest to drop the hammer. Chen Liangling, who pays attention to justice, believes that the most attractive thing about auction, a thousand-year-old transaction method, is that it is fair and just, and the highest price is obtained, "which is also the way to best reflect the value of a work." ”
People are familiar with Chen Liangling's gentle and generous conversation at the auction, but behind the gentleness, she has a ghost horse elf or a confused and careless side. In private, she used to express herself with body language, saying that she would accidentally spill her coffee all day long. She is sensitive to numbers partially, only to systematic, logical numbers. "If there is a formula, like the bidding ladder in a British auction, piled up in one bite at a time, I am very sensitive." For the price tag that pervades life, she is often casual and careless, "I am not very calculating, personality is not like this." "If you pay a little attention, you will see that Chen Liangling sometimes turns the mallet on the auction table, only because of the hammer that fell and made a sound, she often knocked it down so hard that the hammer head and the handle of the hammer were loose and had to be tightened temporarily. Sometimes, she would forget to bring the auction mallet to the scene, temporarily asking her colleagues to borrow the auction mallet, and when she said this, she laughed, "I should have a deeper affection for my auction mallet, right?" ”
In 2016, Chen Liangling, who had been training for two years under Christie's auctioneer mentor Hugh Edmeades, took the stage for the first time with an auction hammer. Thinking back to her first time on stage, she teased herself, "When I first came on stage, my voice was a little more nervous. The chairman at the time came over to help me adjust the microphone, and I saw him, so worried, thinking: What does he want? Think I'm shooting too badly and want to get me off the stage? Ha ha. As a result, that day, she was too nervous to miss a whole page of lots when turning over "Auctioneer's Notes", "I accidentally turned over a continuous page of lots." On the screen were the first two lots, and I started reading the next one. Then, my colleague pointed and said to me in English, you shot wrong! I actually saw a colleague laughing at the telephone seat and fall out of his chair! ”
In a few words, a clever man who knows the power of humor jumps in front of him. She knows how to grasp the scale of language, when to put it and when to put it, so that she knows it in her heart. It is not difficult to imagine that when Chen Liangling's humor and the satin cheongsam and plain face embedded in the buckle appear together in the fierce competition, a gentle force will be formed, driving the atmosphere, and zhang relaxed and rapidly pull up the bidding ladder.
If the ratio of the work of the auctioneer to the porcelain expert is converted into a number, Chen Liangling will give a ratio of about 1:99, after all, her most common thing to do is to deal with porcelain. Tracing her relationship with porcelain, she remembered that when she was a child, she often went to the National Palace Museum in Taipei with her mother to see exhibitions. At that time, my mother would patiently point to the pieces of art and tell her: This is the Ru kiln, that is the Ding kiln, this is Mao Gongding, that is the "Journey to the Creek and Mountains"... "When I was very young, the first concept of Chinese cultural relics was porcelain. ”
Chen Liangling was deeply influenced by the aesthetics of her parents' life, "My mother likes antiques, art, and likes to go to museums. In her understanding, whether it is art or Chinese cultural relics, it is actually something that can be used for life. My mother likes to make tea, likes to drink tea made in Yixing purple sand pot while listening to Teresa Teng's records, I remember when I was a child, there would be some antique teapots at home, and my mother often took them to appreciate. The family education without trace has gradually become Chen Liangling's artistic enlightenment, "Our family has a set of attitudes to life: things must be neatly arranged, clean, concise and neat. Slowly, I developed my own aesthetic view, whether it is dress, interior design or admiration of architectural styles, paintings have a lot to do with the background of the life I grew up in, and so is my personality. I love the paintings of Wassily Kandinsky, the father of abstraction, with clean, clean lines that look comfortable. ”
She considers herself a person with a wide range of interests, majoring in biological sciences in college, but also studying literature, anthropology and wine tasting, because she learned too much and found life too interesting, but it was difficult to determine the future career direction for a while. After graduation, Chen Liangling decided to take a gap year, that is, this year, she volunteered as a tour guide at the National Palace Museum in Taipei for nearly a year. Just in time for the 80th anniversary of the National Palace Museum in Taipei to organize the "Grand View" series of special exhibitions, rarely seen authentic works are displayed one by one. "Guo Xi's "Early Spring Map", Fan Kuan's "Journey to Xishan", Su Shi's "Cold Food Post", the courtyard collection and the Ru kiln on overseas loan exhibition and other works of art were exhibited almost at the same time, which gave me the opportunity to learn and let me find my hidden interest in not being discovered." As a child, she thought for the first time about how to use Chinese art as a career option, and then Chen Liangling went to Christie's Academy of Fine Arts in London to study for a master's degree in Chinese art history, and finally joined Christie's Hong Kong China Porcelain and Art Department in 2010.
This person, who was born on the day capricorn and Aquarius met, she knew too well what kind of person she was. "Serious, rigorous, efficient," she threw out keywords. Even though her auction videos were a hit on social networks, she rarely appeared on social networks except for Facebook, which she had opened in her early years to contact friends and family. She is a true fan of movies and anime, and her favorite directors are Denis Villeneuve and Christopher Nolan, impressed by the dream world of sound and light. She loves to read martial arts novels and feels that the world of martial arts is black and white, and good people and bad people are easy to distinguish. "It's a world of righteousness and hard work, and I love it." She said that the head of Jin Yong's character is Dao, only loves Qiao Feng, does not love things will only Ling Bo micro-step away from Duan Yu, she feels that Ren Yingying has quite an independent female style, "I know very well what I want, active, modern, not the kind of woman who only promises." ”
She is a fan of Lin Qingxia, and has seen the movie "The Undefeated Rise of the East" starring Lin Qingxia 23 times, so she is often laughed at by her family. Lin Qingxia once went to Christie's Hong Kong office to see the auction preview, and Chen Liangling became a fan in the office, "I was in front of Lin Qingxia, the whole person blushed, and my colleagues felt next to me: Alas, your colleague is really ashamed." She laughed after speaking, and added by the way, "Lin Qingxia dressed as a man in the movie, very heroic, very handsome!" A big reason why I'm doing Chinese art today is because of martial arts novels and "The Rise of the Undefeated In the East", which I have loved since I was a child. ”
After years in the industry, Chen Liangling is also gradually becoming softer. She said, "When I first entered the industry, I may have read too many martial arts novels, and I would feel that black and white were clear, which was easily reflected in the auction." We have a bidding ladder, let's say 2 million now, 2.2 million for the next bite. If the guest wants 2.1 million, then my first reaction is to think of refusal. Now, I will first calm down and think, how can I make the lot achieve better results? No more hard-hitting ways, there will be compromise ways – not directly no, not the yes way. ”
Chen Liangling deeply remembers the advice that her mentor Hugh Edmeades told her, "Be yourself." She remembered a concise but powerful sentence for many years, and now she has a deeper understanding, "Auctioneers learn something new at every auction, which is not learned in ordinary training." You don't have to be too nervous and don't have to worry about what others think of you. Many people will worry about whether they look good on the auction stage before they go on the auction stage, and the gestures are not beautiful, I think the ultimate goal of the auctioneer is to sell the lot at the best results, and to shoot it responsibly. To be yourself is to be your own style and do your responsibilities well. No one can get all the positive reviews, but you have to have a ruler in your heart and know that you are doing things well. ”
Those boiling voices in the outside world, no matter whether they are positive or negative, Chen Liangling does not care so much, she put it into a smile. "When you're doing something you like and make you comfortable, it's natural for you to show an attitude that makes everyone feel comfortable, whether it's elegance, confidence, or some seemingly decent adjective. Be yourself, so that you can live a comfortable life. ”
M.C.: Christie's Spring Auction is coming, usually during auction week, what is your daily job like?
Chen Liangling: In the case of an artifact expert, I have to contact the guests. Due to the epidemic, many guests are unable to come to the auction site, and we often introduce the lots to the guests by video. For example, if a guest wants to see a Tian Huang seal, we will let him understand the color and texture of the Tian Huang seal under different lights through video... Some guests will want to see the restoration under the illumination of the purple light, and there will be many different requirements. I spend a lot of time with guests introducing lots and answering their needs. At the same time, I will also serve as an auction officer in other departments, such as watches, Chinese paintings and calligraphy, modern and contemporary paintings, etc. In these days of auction week, I have nearly 20% to 30% of the time on the auction table, taking care of both sides, which is my main job.
M.C.: You have developed a distinctive and appropriate dress style at auction, at auction, have you ever linked the color and style of your dress to the information of the lot on the day of the auction?
Chen Liangling: If Chinese paintings and calligraphy or utensils are mostly antiques, I usually wear a cheongsam. For example, if I shoot a watch, I wear fashion. I usually do it according to the color of the auction hall wall, the current wall is led light projection, raw gray, dress, I will choose the color to jump out of the light color system.
M.C. In addition to liking art and watching movies, what hobbies do you have in your daily life?
Chen Liangling: I really like to travel. Before the pandemic, between Christie's Spring and Autumn Auction Season, I would definitely travel. I like cities with culture, I like Rome, Kyoto, Beijing, I also like the natural environment, I like to climb mountains, go to forests, soak in hot springs. Sometimes you work for a long time or you live in the same place for a long time, and the familiar people and things around you will make you forget that the world is so big and there are so many possibilities.
M.C. What advice do you have for women who aspire to work as auctioneers for the future?
Chen Liangling: No matter what kind of work everyone does and what kind of life they aspire to have, if you have a goal, you should try to move forward! Sometimes, the voice of the outside world will tell you: you can't do it, you don't do it well enough, you see how good people are doing, please believe in yourself, don't always compare with others. I think comparison sometimes inhibits my own growth. Of course, it is important that you reflect on what you have done, can appreciate the merits of others, and keep some of your own characteristics at all times. Don't pay too much attention to what others tell you.
Photography / RICKY LO
Interview, Writer/ Xu Lu
Editor/Yuan Xin
Styling /PATRYK CHAOU
Makeup/OMIX Leung Chi Chun
Hairstyles /PETER CHENG