@william That would be 100% acceptable if Mr. X was acting as an agent. But, he was my partner, so he had a legal responsibility to disclose the payment, and he had potentially acted against the better interest of the partnership.

Anyway… it’s in the past… I’m a bit wiser as a consequence.

@greeno107 The more you talk about Mr. X the more I dislike him. But thank you for sharing some of the experience with us. It is so helpful to learn form those who have been through such things. 

@johnshoe I appreciate your sentiment.  Be aware, that the antiques/art trade is in many ways not the most righteous occupation.

Let's face the truth... we all hope to happen upon a valuable treasure for little money.  In other words, we benefit from the mistakes and lack of knowledge of others.... certainly not a guide to sainthood, and I am as guilty as the next person in this regard.

However, benefiting from having superior knowledge in the field is not the same as outright lying and crooked dealing, which is what Mr. X did.

Fortunately, I do believe folks like him are the minority, people are generally good intentioned, and best to just focus on the future.

I enjoyed sharing my story with you and others.  I do hope you have the an even better experience down the road!  Cheers!

@greeno107 I have been reflecting a bit on the aspects of this industry that you mentioned since getting involved a few years back. I have concluded that it is all relative. For example, there are situations when I might tell another dealer/collector something they don't know about a piece they have rather than buying it for a steal of a price from them. There are other times when I will happily buy the piece at what I know is a ridiculously low price and walk away without any feelings of guilt. It all depends on the situation, the people involved, etc. The further along I go, the more I seem to feel like when opportunities come our way we are worthy to be rewarded for our knowledge acquired and good judgement, which is the result of our sensibilities and efforts of study and experience. I have had several discussions with local dealers who I have bought things from who simply have no interest in digging more deeply into the Asian arts to discover the nuances or acquire the knowledge. For those people I offer no quarter. If they have something of great value but they do not care to research and realize it, then in my mind they have made their choice to forfeit the profits that they could have otherwise realized had they cared enough to invest the time and do the work. I feel differently about those who do have a sincere interest to know but yet might not know many things yet. I put myself in that category in many ways. I want to know, and I am trying to know, but sometimes the information has not yet become available to me. For example, I have paintings that I do not know who painted. They could be worth a million dollars, yet I have not been able yet to figure it out yet. I am researching and seeking help, but that help and information is not always easy to come by. Now, if I posted such a painting or some other object on this forum, asking the members here to help me learn about it, and one of them knew but chose not to teach me, then I think that other person might be making an error in judgement. It would be different if I posted pictures and said "hey I don't know what this is but if anyone wants to buy it make me an offer."  But if I post pictures and say "hey does anyone know what this is, I'd like to learn more about it" etc, then the job of others is to help educate me, not try to profit off of my ignorance. At any rate, my reading is that your Mr. X is an abomination to the industry, and I absolutely heed your warning about the sharks swimming in our beautiful waters. I'll keep a keep a sharp spear at the ready, just in case now and then they need a good poke. Cheers!  John

@greeno107 

Hi Tim - 

A cautionary tale and lesson for all, thank you for sharing  ...

Indeed fortuitous that, due to concernes, you took the decision to keep detailed records of all exchanges between yourself and Mr X ...

Pleased that, eventually, you received payment duely owed from the sale ...

Stuart  

@xin_fawis @clayandbrush @greeno107 

Hi Xin, Giovanni, Tim and all - 

In regards to this piece sold at Christie’s in 2015 and the related story posted by Xin, some further ‘flesh on the bones’, so to speak ... 

I know two people, both very highly experienced, who actually saw/handled this bowl, one of whom at the time worked for Bluett’s, one of the great old London dealerships and accompanied Mr Paul Freeman when visiting the Percival David Foundation Coll, at that time housed at Gordon Square, to compare this bowl with the two cited in Christie’s catalogue entry, last image, which are similar but a differing shape and overall design ...

Having done so the conclusion reach at the time was that this piece was not YZ period but a later copy, possible Republic or 1950/60’s. The two gentleman known both remember that the overall painting feel slightly short, and the porcelain ‘lack the feel’ of Imperial YZ wares and neither have changed there thoughts on this piece ...

Having spoken to these two gentleman, Xin is quite right with the other auction houses and dealers named who saw/handled this piece, these included Giuseppe Eskenazi, Julian Thompson of Sotheby’s and people at Bluett’s, Spinks, Sparks and Marchant’s, all of whom thought it a later copy ... 

Now that’s quite a wealth of knowledge and experience and many of those above had, by the 80’s, traveled to view/see and handled the Imperial collections both in the Gugong, Beijing and the NPM, Taipei ...

Given it was fairly common knowledge this piece had been ‘knocking around’ differing outlets on Kensington Church St for some time before Mr Gerald  Hawthorn acquired in the 70’s and subsequently sold onto Mr Bonney and Mr Freeman, and also it’s lack of any solid provenance, those above may well not have been prepared to accept it as authentic ...

Both the gentleman known are, of course, delighted that Mr Freeman was able to sell for such a high price years after acquiring - but just because such a price was obtained at auction does not mean, as had been known and seen before, the object is genuine ...

Stuart 

@greeno107 

Hi Tim,

I have been very busy last week and my wife was ill. Now I'm back to reply.

Thank you for sharing this story. It's very impressive. You should write a book about your treasure huntings.

I 'm sorry you made that bad experience with those people. To be honest as Chinese I'm also very careful with Chinese dealers or collectors, of course auction houses. They are different from American, European and Japanese people in this business. Johan has indeed good reputation. It's very obvious Mr. X was the trouble maker in this case. You don't need an agent for such thing.

Back to the topic I have started here. There was a lot of discussion in the Asian circle. Many Chinese and Hong Kong colletors, dealers plus scholars were very irritated and confused by the Sotheby's dating on these "20th century" pieces. But some big European dealers are agree with Sotheby's view.

Xin

@xin_fawis Thank you for the kind words.

Not to detract from our main conversation about the Sotheby's bowls, but I would like to ask a favor.

Please, if you have the opportunity to speak to Mr. Bian, kindly extend my appologies for the harsh remarks I made during the ordeal with Mr. X.

During the dispute with Mr. X, it was an unfortunate necessity for me to use strong language towards Mr. Bian in order to ensure that my  situation with Mr. X would resolve to my favor, and often I wrote in a manner that was not my true feelings.

Honestly, the time and effort that Mr. Bian and Johan auction put into marketing the vase was extraordinary, and had this situation not arisen with Mr. X, I really had hopes to have an established relationship with Johan to be my auction of choice outside of the USA.

I have never spoken negatively of Mr. Bian or Johan to anyone.  They did a very good job.

The Yongzheng doucai bowl from Sotheby's talked about in this thread in now listed at Poly - this time stated to be Yongzheng mark AND period ...

https://www.polyauction.com.hk/en/buy-and-sell/auctions/lot-listings/365/details/46710/?currencyType=USD