On the morning of April 30, 2022, at the Spring Auction site of Sotheby's Hong Kong, Zhang Daqian's "Imitation of Wang Ximeng's "A Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains" was sold for HK$370.495 million, setting a new world record for the auction of Zhang Daqian's works.
Zhang Daqian imitates Wang Ximeng's "Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains"
Set color silk vertical scroll made in 1947
133.6 x 72.8 cm
Transaction price: HK$370.495 million
Sotheby's Hong Kong Spring Auction 2022
The auction site started at HK$40 million, instantly exceeding the highest valuation, HK$70 million, HK$75 million... In the telephone bidding between the tug-of-war, after 100 million Hong Kong dollars, the competition into the white-hot, in the 150 million Hong Kong dollars, began to raise the price of the small ladder, but even so, no one wants to miss, when the price reached 200 million Hong Kong dollars, auction officer Guo Dongjie is also difficult to hide excitement, but the competition is still not over, 235 million Hong Kong dollars, Guo Dongjie also announced that this has surpassed the highest price record of Zhang Daqian's "Taoyuan Map", all people are holding their breath at this moment, just to see what kind of high price Zhang Daqian can rush to, HK$300 million! It continued, and finally fell at HK$320 million, plus commission for HK$370.495 million, setting a record for the highest price at Zhang Daqian's auction!
After the auction, the auction practitioners and even the entire art circle boiled over, and Chen Zhenlian, vice chairman of the China Federation of Literary and Art Circles, even admitted frankly, "This auction is an 'event', a happy and exciting 'event'." ”
A list of Zhang Daqian's high-priced works
Zhang Daqian Taoyuan map
1982 Vertical Shaft Splashed Ink Splash Colored Paper 209×92.2cm
Price realised: HKD 270,680,000
Sotheby's Hong Kong Spring Auction 2016
Previously, the highest price record for Zhang Daqian's works was in the 2016 Sotheby's Spring Auction in Hong Kong, and Zhang Daqian's 1982 "Peach Blossom Garden" was sold for HK$270.68 million.
Zhang Daqian, 1978 Autumn Dawn
Mirror heart Colored paper
Realized price: RMB 195,500,000
China Guardian Autumn Auction 2021
Zhang Daqian made Bifeng Ancient Temple in 1967
Vertical shaft Color gold note 127.7×63cm
Price realised: HKD 209,100,000
Christie's Hong Kong Spring Auction 2021
Zhang Daqian in 1965 in the Swiss Snow Mountains
Mirror Center Colored Silk 173×344cm
Realized price: RMB 164,450,000
Beijing Poly Autumn Auction 2016
Peruse the relationship between the master Zhang Daqian and the genius Wang Ximeng's "Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains"
In view of this wonderful masterpiece of Zhang Daqian's green and green, Artron Art Network also specially invited Zhu Haoyun, a senior art media person and Artron columnist, to write an article to appreciate Zhang Daqian's lifelong artistic experience and the comparison with Wang Ximeng's "Map of a Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains".
Zhang Daqian, a myth of the art market (1899-1983)
As we all know, Zhang Daqian made a living by painting all his life, which was his strength in holding exhibitions and selling paintings, and it was also a very important way to make money in his life. According to relevant information, in the 1930s and 1940s, especially in the mid-to-late 1940s, his paintings were counted as few as two (gold) per painting, and as many as strips (gold) per painting. Although the price is expensive, but the sales are very good, whether in Beiping, Tianjin, Nanjing, or in Shanghai, Chongqing, Chengdu, as long as the exhibition is held, the works are always sold out, and some are even re-ordered, such as Zhang Daqian and the female disciple Ye Mingpei's "Ziyou Guan Bamboo Map" (大千画人, Ye Mingpei painting bamboo) was re-ordered 27 times at the 1947 Shanghai Art Exhibition, which shows the popularity of Daqian's paintings. It can be said that during the Republic of China, the painters in the north and south markets were probably only Zhang Daqian.
In May 1948, Zhang Daqian held the "Zhang Daqian Near Works Exhibition" at the Chinese Painting Garden on Chengdu Road in Shanghai, which was a catalogue of paintings and stamped with the seal of Dafengtang.
One of the most sensational exhibitions was from May 8 to 11, 1948, when Daqian held a four-day "Zhang Daqian Near Works Exhibition" in the Chinese Painting Garden on Chengdu Road in Shanghai, exhibiting a total of 99 works, the vast majority of which were brilliant and dazzling. Every day, the visitors were crowded and crowded, the red notes ordered were labeled with "full of red", and some paintings were re-ordered three to five times, which was unprecedented. Wu Hufan, a famous painter who was extremely popular, also selected three large paintings on the spot, and then asked others to order several paintings on his behalf. Some people at the exhibition made tentative estimates of the results of the exhibition, believing that it could be equivalent to about one hundred and dozens of gold on the market (up to about one thousand and hundred taels), which was an unprecedented miracle at that time.
In the catalogue of Zhang Daqian's recent works exhibition in Shanghai in 1948, it was found that exhibit No. 42 at that time was the vertical axis of Zhang Daqian's "Imitation of Wang Ximeng's Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains" (133.6 x 72.8cm) that would be auctioned in the spring of Sotheby's, but it was listed as "non-sale". According to Sotheby's, after the painting was returned to the Shanghai celebrity Sun Zhifei, he was blessed with treasure and rarely shown, and only in 1983 he borrowed the Shanghai "Zhang Daqian's Posthumous Works Exhibition" and the Beijing "Zhang Daqian Painting Exhibition".
If you carefully appreciate Zhang Daqian's painting, it is necessary to compare Zhang Daqian's imitation with the Northern Song Dynasty King Xi Meng's "Map of a Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains".
Northern Song Dynasty Wang Ximeng's "Map of a Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains"
Long roll Size 51.5× 1191.5cm
Collection of the Palace Museum
Green landscape is a technique of Chinese painting that occupies an important position in the ancient painting art. This kind of painting is mainly in green and green colors, with neat brushes and heavy colors with fine brushes, and the colors are strong and full of vitality. Colored with litholite green inside the hook line. The strong color is called the big green landscape, and the lighter color is called the small green landscape. If you add mud to outline the outline of the mountain ridge tree, it is called "golden landscape" (actually more than one color of mud). These works are noble and gorgeous, visually good, and durable. Unfortunately, after the Ming Dynasty, the green landscape gradually declined, and in recent times, it was revived, and Zhang Daqian can be said to be one of the bull's ears. He spared no expense to search for famous deeds, painstakingly pursued them, and perfected them in the 1940s. At the time of this painting, Zhang Daqian lived in Zhaojue Temple in Chengdu, which was at the peak of his traditional landscape creation, so he dared to challenge the model works of green landscapes, and now only this one is seen.
Zhang Daqian's 1948 work "Imitation of Wang Ximeng's Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains" details
However, comparing the two paintings, we will find many differences. Wang Ximeng's "Map of a Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains", 51.5 centimeters in length and 1191.5 centimeters in width, on silk, green and green, without a paragraph, according to the cai jing inscription after the volume, it is known that it was written by Wang Ximeng. According to expert research, it is a painting by Wang ximeng when he was 18 years old, and the only remaining work of Wang Ximeng, which has a great influence on future generations, and is called "one of the top ten famous paintings in China", which is now in the Palace Museum.
On February 25, 2017, China Post Group Corporation issued a set of 9 special stamps of "A Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains" with a set of 9 Tongjing Edition tickets. Wang Zuo is a long scroll in shape, and up to nearly 12 meters long, through the horizontal panorama to show the Jiangnan landscape, the picture with the vast rivers and rivers, the rolling hills constitute a wonderful Jiangnan landscape beauty, fishing villages and wild markets, water pavilions, thatched grass huts, water mill long bridges and other quiet scenery interspersed with fishing, boating, playing, catching up with the market and other moving scenes, can be described as dynamic and static, complement each other. The painting of zhongshan stone is first painted with ink color, and then green and heavy color, and the top of the mountain is dyed with bluestone green, showing the green mountains. The rivers outline the water patterns, which contrast with the boneless colors. The whole picture is both magnificent and majestic, but also delicate and exquisite, representing the milestone of Chinese green landscape painting.
Zhang Daqian's 1948 work "Imitation of Wang Ximeng's Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains" details
Zhang Daqian's imitation does not use Wang Ximeng's hand-rolled system, but adopts a large vertical shaft, with a scale of nearly 9 square feet. The whole picture can be divided into three sections, the close-up tree grass pavilion, two coats and the boy carrying the piano are happily walking towards the deserted grass pavilion; the middle scene is a coat standing on the steps to look at the scenery; a small sailing boat on the river surface of the distant view is slowly coming, and then in the distance is the islands overlapping, small bridge huts, mountains and mountains, like a hopeful, feasible, swimtable, habitable wonderland, let people linger. In terms of creative techniques, Zhang Daqian takes green as the main tone, and adds color with mud gold, and the exquisite treatment is amazing.
Whether it is characters, pine trees, mountain stones, fishing boats, huts, small bridges, river water, etc., the depiction of the picture is meticulous, especially the water waves on the river surface are lined with gold wires, which sparkle and golden light under the sunlight; mr. Zhang Daqian, a bird in the distance, uses a pen to gently touch, with the state of spreading its wings and soaring, vividly; the sky, the mountain silhouette, and the bottom of the slope are covered with mud gold, brilliant clouds. The whole picture is full of colors, dazzling and intoxicating, and the elegance of the literati is revealed in the grandeur. Daqian will be boneless, green, golden, smelting a furnace, fine pen hook gold covering nearly half of the picture, in his works, I am afraid that this is all!
There are too many artistic things that Mr. Daqian can talk about! He has overseas experience that some of the great Chinese art giants of the last century, such as Qi Baishi, did not have in china. His painting style is derived from tradition but is also the most avant-garde and bold, and the later development of art is also very different from other modern masters.
As the most important and even world-class artist in China in the twentieth century, the value of art is naturally highly affirmed, the market price is with the overall economic trend, the future collection market of Daqian continues to be optimistic, and the development is absolutely unlimited!