中國當(dāng)代藝術(shù)充滿希望

Fabien Fryns

　　草場地F2畫廊的主人Fabien Fryns表示，他并不擔(dān)心金融危機(jī)。

　　“中端藝術(shù)品已經(jīng)退出市場，但高端和低端還很強(qiáng)勁。”

　　什么是中端？按照他的說法就是價(jià)格3萬至50萬美元的作品。

　　與股票市場，或者其他投資市場相比較，中國當(dāng)代藝術(shù)仍然是一個(gè)不錯(cuò)的投資選擇。

　　一些北京最好的畫廊主都認(rèn)為，震蕩重組對經(jīng)銷商和藝術(shù)家來說都是一個(gè)積極的發(fā)展機(jī)會(huì)。沒有人喜歡泡沫，越來越多的人都認(rèn)識(shí)到，財(cái)富來得太容易會(huì)摧毀藝術(shù)家的創(chuàng)造力。

栗憲庭

　　被認(rèn)為是“當(dāng)代藝術(shù)運(yùn)動(dòng)精神之父”的前《中國美術(shù)》雜志編輯栗憲庭認(rèn)為，媒體宣傳將許多藝術(shù)家制造成了“金錢偶像”，衍生了一種扭曲的藝術(shù)形式。

　　剛從紐約回來的雕塑家和畫家潘興磊認(rèn)為，金融危機(jī)能夠淘汰那些不認(rèn)真的藝術(shù)家，“認(rèn)真嚴(yán)謹(jǐn)?shù)乃囆g(shù)家可以借此機(jī)會(huì)反思并改進(jìn)自己的想法，而其他人將會(huì)被淘汰。”

　　2005年，蘇富比成立了亞洲當(dāng)代藝術(shù)部，并開始收購相關(guān)作品，火熱的中國當(dāng)代藝術(shù)開始引起國際廣泛關(guān)注。

　　“情況開始變得復(fù)雜和困難，因?yàn)樵S多藝術(shù)家都被寵壞了，”Fryns說，“過去這幾年的情況相當(dāng)瘋狂，你只有一個(gè)小時(shí)的時(shí)間來決定是否買一件作品。”

　　2006年3月，一場預(yù)期拍賣額為600萬美元的拍賣會(huì)最后銷售額為1300萬美元。2007年，岳敏君的一幅作品賣出了590萬美元。

　　許多中國的百萬富翁們開始向藝術(shù)領(lǐng)域投資。“他們都不了解是什么使得當(dāng)代藝術(shù)如此成功，因此他們都去買那些最高價(jià)的作品。”Fryns說。

Brian Wallace

　　798已經(jīng)成為北京最受歡迎旅游目的地第三名，但是同時(shí)，一些更獨(dú)立的畫廊和更認(rèn)真的藝術(shù)家已經(jīng)轉(zhuǎn)移到更加偏遠(yuǎn)的地區(qū)，比如宋莊和草場地。

　　紅門畫廊的經(jīng)營者Brian Wallace指出，798似乎正在從畫廊發(fā)展成買賣市場，但是他也毫不懷疑中國將會(huì)繼續(xù)為當(dāng)代藝術(shù)投入巨大的創(chuàng)造力和高招技藝。

　　“在中國，藝術(shù)是一種職業(yè)道路，”Brian Wallace說，“就像成為一個(gè)醫(yī)生或律師一樣。”

　　經(jīng)濟(jì)衰退對房地產(chǎn)的影響聯(lián)系到藝術(shù)身上將會(huì)是另一種情況。作為第一家關(guān)注當(dāng)代藝術(shù)的獨(dú)立美術(shù)館，今日美術(shù)館很可能會(huì)取得成功。

　　Fryns則表示F2和其他一些畫廊更喜歡位置偏遠(yuǎn)的草場地，因?yàn)檫@里有許多合理空間。如果一位收藏家想要飛到北京來買一幅畫，他能很容易就找到這里。同時(shí)，他還堅(jiān)信，從長遠(yuǎn)來看，最好的藝術(shù)品一定會(huì)保持它的價(jià)值。“當(dāng)今市場上真正高質(zhì)量的東西很少，大家都抓緊手里有的東西。而中國有許多新興的億萬富翁，一旦他們擁有了一些東西，他們就有可能轉(zhuǎn)向當(dāng)代藝術(shù)市場，想要收藏中國最好的東西，但是這些東西的數(shù)量是有限的。”

（來源：globepost，點(diǎn)擊參看原文）
 

【編輯：張明湖】 

Chinese art — not a bust
Beijing artists and gallery owners say the economic downturn will improve quality.

　　BEIJING — Fabien Fryns, who runs the F2 gallery in Caochangdi village on the outskirts of Beijing, does not look like a man who is worried about the financial crisis.

　　“The middle has dropped out of the market,” said Fryns, discretely smoking a cigar in the gallery’s voluminous interior garden, “but the top and the bottom are both strong.”

　　What is "the middle"? Pieces from $30,000 to $500,000, according to Fryns.

　　Compared to the stock market, or nearly any other place one can put one’s money these days, Chinese contemporary art still looks like a very good investment. Recent art auctions in Hong Kong have registered sales at the high end of their estimates, even though the targets the auction houses are setting for themselves are less ambitious today than previous years.

　　The owners of some of the best Beijing galleries said the shakeout promises to be a positive development for dealers, but also for artists. No one likes a bubble and there was growing concern that easy riches were destroying creativity by encouraging Chinese artists to go after major sales, rather than the real thing.

　　Li Xianting, the former editor of the magazine China Fine Arts who is considered the spiritual father of the contemporary art movement, said media hype transformed many artists into “money celebrities” and produced a twisted form of art.

　　Pan Xing Lei, a sculptor and painter who recently returned to Beijing from New York, said the financial crisis would weed out less serious artists.

　　“The artists who are serious can take this time to reflect and to develop their ideas,” he said. “The others will go back to their villages, or do something else.”

　　The craze over contemporary Chinese art began to trigger serious waves on the international art scene in 2005, after the auction house Sotheby’s established an Asian contemporary art department and began buying up works. Many of the artists were reacting to the Tiananmen Square massacre and grappling with the wrenching changes in Chinese society, a fact that made them especially interesting as an emerging China began to make its influence felt in other domains.

　　“The relationship was becoming difficult because many of the artists were spoiled,” Fryns said. “The scene in the last few years was crazy. You were given an hour to decide if you wanted to buy a piece.”

　　In March 2006, an auction that was expected to bring in $6 million raised $13 million. In 2007, a single painting, “Executioner,” by Yue Minjun, famous for his cynical-realist political pop caricatures of himself with a frozen smile, went for $5.9 million, up from the $32,200 the original owner had paid a decade earlier.

　　With results like that, China’s own millionaires, many of them newly minted, began buying art mostly as investment.
“None of them had time to study what it was that was making contemporary art so successful,” Fryns said, “so they bought the pieces that were going for the highest prices.”

　　A sprawling gallery complex known as 798, which occupies a former military factory complex, became the third most popular tourist destination in Beijing. By the time it had succeeded, however, the more exclusive galleries and many of the more serious artists had already moved to more remote art villages, including Songzhuan and Caochangdi, where F2 is located.

　　Brian Wallace, who runs the Red Gate Gallery in an ancient guard tower on a remnant of the city’s original Ming wall, noted that 798 seems to be evolving from gallery space to retail space. But Wallace had no doubt that China will continue to inject enormous creativity and professionalism into the contemporary art scene.

　　"Art is a career path in China,” Wallace said. “It is like being a doctor or a lawyer.”

　　The recession’s impact on real estate speculation connected to art may be a different story. Beijing’s dazzling Today Art Museum, the city’s first independent museum focusing on contemporary art, will probably succeed. But a flashy nearby gallery complex known as 22 Art Plaza International, which had intended to capitalize on the museum’s attraction, stands largely empty.

　　Fryns said F2 and other leading galleries prefer the more remote location at Caochangdi, because the space is reasonable, and there is a lot of it. A collector who has flown to Beijing, ready to spend a million dollars or more on a painting, has no difficulty finding the location.

　　“We don’t get the drop-in crowd, the casual passers-by, the young couple with cameras, but that is not what we're looking for,” Fryns said.

　　And Fryns is convinced that in the long term, the best art will continue to hold its value. “There is very little quality material coming on the market today,” he said. “People are holding on to what they have. There are a lot of newly wealthy Chinese billionaires. Once they have bought everything else, a certain number will turn to contemporary art. They will want to collect the best work that is Chinese, and there is a limited supply of that."
 

（來源：globepost，點(diǎn)擊參看譯文）