Early draft of Xu Beihong to go under hammer – Xinhua News Agency

From Xinhua News Agency:

An early draft of a masterpiece of Chinese artist Xu Beihong(徐悲鸿), will be auctioned on June 25 in Beijing, and the vendors hope it will stay on the Chinese mainland after more than 60 years overseas.

The “Yugong Yishan” or “the foolish old man who removed the mountain” (ÊÑöÂÖ¨Áߪ±±)had been auctioned once before in China, but it had never had a mainland owner, said an official with the Beijing Hanhai Art Auction Co..

In the year 2000, a Taiwanese collector bought the superb oil painting in an online auction by the China Guardian Auction Co., Ltd, for 2.5 million yuan (about 310,000 U.S. dollars). [full text]