{"id":7849,"date":"2006-06-01T16:19:43","date_gmt":"2006-06-01T23:19:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/2006\/06\/01\/a-mirror-to-chinas-art-scene-frederik-balfour\/"},"modified":"2006-06-01T16:19:43","modified_gmt":"2006-06-01T23:19:43","slug":"a-mirror-to-chinas-art-scene-frederik-balfour","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/2006\/06\/a-mirror-to-chinas-art-scene-frederik-balfour\/","title":{"rendered":"A Mirror to China&#8217;s Art Scene &#8211; Frederik Balfour"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/mt-old\/Chairman_Mao_Visit_Guangdong_Country.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Chairman_Mao_Visit_Guangdong_Country.jpg\" src=\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/mt-old\/Chairman_Mao_Visit_Guangdong_Country-thumb.jpg\" width=\"169\" height=\"98\" \/><\/a> <\/p>\n<p>\nFrom Business Week:\n<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\nWith more than 1,400 works from 200 different Chinese contemporary artists, Swiss businessman Uli Sigg has amassed the world&#8217;s most comprehensive collection of Chinese contemporary art. Sigg lived in China in the 1980s while working for Schindler Lifts, a manufacturer of escalators and elevators. Yet it wasn&#8217;t until he returned to China as Swiss ambassador in 1995 that he began collecting.<\/p>\n<p>He spoke to BusinessWeek Correspondent Frederik Balfour on the sidelines of the Christie&#8217;s Art Auction in Hong Kong about the genesis of his collection, motivations of contemporary artists, and the recent skyrocketing prices of Chinese art. [<a href=\"http:\/\/www.businessweek.com\/globalbiz\/content\/jun2006\/gb20060601_423033.htm\">Full text<\/a>]\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>\nSee also &#8220;China: Cultural Evolution&#8221; from Business Week (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.businessweek.com\/globalbiz\/content\/may2006\/gb20060525_217165.htm\">link<\/a>); &#8211; &#8220;The Price Of Chairman Mao&#8221; by Letters from China (<a href=\"http:\/\/voyage.typepad.com\/china\/2005\/11\/market_price_12.html \"target=\"_blank\">link<\/a>); &#8211; &#8220;Speculation inflates Chinese contemporary art prices&#8221; by The Art Newspaper (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.theartnewspaper.com\/article01.asp?id=266 \"target=\"_blank\">link<\/a>); &#8211; &#8220;Christie&#8217;s Sells Record HK$1.19 Bln Asian Art in Hong Kong Sale&#8221; by Bloomberg (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\/apps\/news?pid=10000088&#038;sid=aNPab0mCkmso&#038;refer=culture \"target=\"_blank\">link<\/a>). For more about Uli Sigg, see this CDT post from last year (<a href=\"\/2005\/08\/a_swiss_champio.php\">link<\/a>).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>From Business Week: With more than 1,400 works from 200 different Chinese contemporary artists, Swiss businessman Uli Sigg has amassed the world&#8217;s most comprehensive collection of Chinese contemporary art. Sigg lived in China in the 1980s while working for Schindler Lifts, a manufacturer of escalators and elevators. Yet it wasn&#8217;t until he returned to China [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[1395,1814,3292],"class_list":["post-7849","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-culture","tag-art","tag-art-market","tag-uli-sigg","et-doesnt-have-format-content","et_post_format-et-post-format-standard"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v24.1 (Yoast SEO v24.1) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>A Mirror to China&#039;s Art Scene - Frederik Balfour<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"http:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/2006\/06\/a-mirror-to-chinas-art-scene-frederik-balfour\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"A Mirror to China&#039;s Art Scene - Frederik Balfour\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"From Business Week: With more than 1,400 works from 200 different Chinese contemporary artists, Swiss businessman Uli Sigg has amassed the world&#8217;s most comprehensive collection of Chinese contemporary art. 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Yet it wasn&#8217;t until he returned to China [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"http:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/2006\/06\/a-mirror-to-chinas-art-scene-frederik-balfour\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"China Digital Times (CDT)\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/ChinaDigitalTimes\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2006-06-01T23:19:43+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/mt-old\/Chairman_Mao_Visit_Guangdong_Country-thumb.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Sophie Beach\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@cdt\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@cdt\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Sophie Beach\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"http:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/2006\/06\/a-mirror-to-chinas-art-scene-frederik-balfour\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"http:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/2006\/06\/a-mirror-to-chinas-art-scene-frederik-balfour\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Sophie Beach\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/#\/schema\/person\/7f19e31b674d57a7dc20aab8e908c663\"},\"headline\":\"A Mirror to China&#8217;s Art Scene &#8211; Frederik Balfour\",\"datePublished\":\"2006-06-01T23:19:43+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2006-06-01T23:19:43+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"http:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/2006\/06\/a-mirror-to-chinas-art-scene-frederik-balfour\/\"},\"wordCount\":168,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/#organization\"},\"keywords\":[\"art\",\"art market\",\"Uli Sigg\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Culture &amp; the Arts\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"http:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/2006\/06\/a-mirror-to-chinas-art-scene-frederik-balfour\/\",\"url\":\"http:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/2006\/06\/a-mirror-to-chinas-art-scene-frederik-balfour\/\",\"name\":\"A Mirror to China's Art Scene - Frederik Balfour\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2006-06-01T23:19:43+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2006-06-01T23:19:43+00:00\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"http:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/2006\/06\/a-mirror-to-chinas-art-scene-frederik-balfour\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"http:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/2006\/06\/a-mirror-to-chinas-art-scene-frederik-balfour\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"http:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/2006\/06\/a-mirror-to-chinas-art-scene-frederik-balfour\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"A Mirror to China&#8217;s Art Scene &#8211; Frederik Balfour\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/\",\"name\":\"China Digital Times (CDT)\",\"description\":\"Covering China from Cyberspace\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/#organization\",\"name\":\"China Digital Times\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/08\/CDT-logo.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/08\/CDT-logo.jpg\",\"width\":186,\"height\":177,\"caption\":\"China Digital Times\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/ChinaDigitalTimes\",\"https:\/\/x.com\/cdt\"]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/#\/schema\/person\/7f19e31b674d57a7dc20aab8e908c663\",\"name\":\"Sophie Beach\",\"description\":\"Sophie Beach is CDT's Operations and Communications Manager. 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