On 3 April 2025, Christie’s Shanghai will host its first 20th/21st Century Evening Sale of 2025. The sale brings the work of modern and contemporary artists worldwide to the auction floor at the BUND ONE Art Museum, but above all, this sale is highlighting the work of Asian artists, Chinese ones in particular. This is highlighted in its top offerings and is a bit of a change from the same sale held in November of 2024, which had more of a Western and Eastern mix at the top end of the estimates.
Leading the sale is Beijing-based artist Chen Ke, one of China’s most prolific, globally recognized artists, who is part of the country’s “New Cartoon” generation. Her painting, Yesterday’s Me, Tomorrow’s You (2012), with an on-request estimate, is a unique piece that, when exhibited, gives off different dimensions and depth for the viewers to immerse themselves in.
Following that are paintings by Zao Wou-Ki, Zeng Fanzhi, Wang Xingwei, and Kazou Shiraga, all prominent Asian artists.
Loat 839 | Chen Ke (b.1978) | Yesterday’s Me, Tomorrow’s You, Oil on canvas (triptych)
Painted in 2012
Overall: 200.5 x 611 cm
Provenance:
- Star Gallery, Beijing
- Acquired from the above by the present owner
Estimate on Request
Born in Tongjiang County, Sichuan, in 1978, Chen Ke is one of China's most globally recognized modern artists whose work has been globally exhibited and celebrated domestically. Her work is part of China’s “New Cartoon” generation, where part of that style is the usage of these calming and cute subjects drawn in a more gentle style that are known for their expressions and emotions rather than their physicality.
In 2012, the painting was displayed as a five-sided, three-dimensional exhibit at the Today Art Museum in Beijing. Arranged as a floating and encapsulated space, it invited audiences to immerse themselves in the piece, not unlike viewing a room from the outside. In this iteration of the work, there was no girl, which is something Chen would add later on, a reflection on how art is never really finished and can always be added to or adjusted.
This painting was made when she was represented by Star Galleries in Beijing, and in 2008, its director, Fang Fang, asked Chen if she wanted to have kids. Chen responded by stating, “I used to not want children, but things have changed.” She further opines on the responsibilities and what it means to raise a person. In 2012, the same year this lot was painted, Chen’s daughter was born, which is a theme of this painting, as she considered how even in a rapidly changing world, human nature is a constant.
Yesterday’s Me, Tomorrow’s You, Exhibited in Today Art Museum, Beijing
The human nature concept delves more into individuality, and that translates into one's personal space in both a metaphorical and literal sense. This piece imagines a period in time and conceptualizes it into a space filled with memories. The past she inserts into this painting is very much of a post-1970s lifestyle, as seen with the CRT TV, enamel dishware, and old brown trunk, and all these other objects that evoke a time before the modern rapid changes of the digital age.
Chen even goes as far as to create these white spots and grainy texture across the whole work, which is a callback to old photographs that age with time and generate an air of nostalgia that covers the entire painting. Further building on the painting as a whole, through its entire six-meter length, it feels like a single narrative being played out, where on the left you see Chen Ke’s past, but the movement to the right is like a movement throughout time to her daughter’s future, as suggested in the title.
Lot 829 | Zao Wou-Ki (1920-2013) | Zitterlein, Oil on canvas
Painted in 1956
54 x 65 cm
Provenance:
- Galerie de France, Paris
- Private collection, Switzerland
- Private collection, Sweden
- Auktionsverk Stockholm, 7 November 2002, lot 955
- Galerie Ivana de Gavardie, Paris
- Rambaud Collection, Paris
- Sotheby’s Paris, 3 June 2021, lot 2
- Acquired at the above sale by the present owner
Estimate: RMB 20,000,000-30,000,000 (around US$2.7-4.1 million)
Painted in 1962 during Zou Wou-Ki’s “Hurricane Period,” this was a 13-year-long period where the artist was at his most prolific, producing well over 100 paintings that came before his more calming, reflective period following his wife’s passing and trip to China. This work is one inspired by oracle bone script from ancient China merged with abstract painting styles he picked up while visiting New York in the late 1950s.
This merger is a representation of his background as a Chinese-French artist who both explored new avenues of art while acknowledging his cultural heritage. The Oracle Bone aspects of Zou’s work were inspired by bronze ritual vessels from the Shang (1600-1460 BCE) and Zhou (1046-256 BCE) dynasties, which in turn inspired him to appreciate his grandfather’s calligraphy and training at the Hangzhou School of Fine Arts.
However, he would rather not be tokenized as an Asian artist when he went to the West, nor did he desire to be found by what he thought was too extreme of traditionalism that was Chinese ink paintings. Hence this more abstract style became his hallmark before he visited China in 1972, embracing more traditional elements of landscape painting.
Zou Wou-Ki | Rouge, bleu, noir (1957) | Harvard Art Museums
Zao's works from this period that are done in this striking red and orange color are rare, with one of the similar pieces being Rouge, bleu, noir (1957), which is currently in Harvard Art Museums. The way the ink covers parts of the painting makes it seem like there are pockets of colorful explosions accentuated by these dynamic black brushstrokes and bursts of blue among them. In a way this painting is about balance and motion, managing the energy of the colors and brushstrokes while showcasing their boldness.
The title of the painting also displays this idea of motion, as Zitterlein broadly translates in English to “ little tremble.” In the work the colors collide and merge together in various areas reminiscent of a rough sea but carefully constructed with brushstrokes instead of haphazardly, hence the “little” or balanced aspect of this painting.
Lot 814 | Zeng Fanzhi (b.1964) | Mask Series No. 4, Oil on linen
Painted in 1997
169 x 199 cm
Provenance:
- ShanghART Gallery, Shanghai
- Private collection (acquired from the above)
- Sotheby’s Hong Kong, 5 October 2014, Lot 1037
- Private collection (acquired at the above sale)
- Christie's Hong Kong, 30 November 2022, Lot 45
- Acquired at the above sale by the present owner
Estimate: RMB10,000,000-18,000,000 (around US$1.3-2.4 million)
Zeng Fanzhi’s Mask series of paintings began in 1994, and they have gone on to become his most recognized and popular series. One of the mask motif paintings even set Fanzhi’s artist record at auction when The Last Supper (2001) sold for HK$180.4 million (around US$23.3 million) in 2013 with Sotheby’s Hong Kong.
This Mask series painting comes before 1997, meaning it was of a different style to later works that were more colorful, detailed, and filled with narratives. Instead, works from this pre-1997 period were more flat color-wise and felt as if his subjects were being dropped in a blank plain space. However, while of a different era, typical Zeng motifs such as the screw-shaped eyes were still present in this period of works.
Zeng paintings from this era were also becoming more complex. Before the mid-1990s, the artwork on Zeng was almost always focused on single subjects, with that changing over time to involve more subjects that would later include weaving narratives into the work. The complexity of these subjects is very much rooted in their appearances. Take for example their hands, which are large, almost grotesque. Zeng states that one can learn a lot through someone’s hands, especially inner feelings, and this is what he tries to express, a depature from most people using the face to showcase emotions.
Zeng Fanzhi | The Last Supper (2001), Oil on canvas | Sold for HK$180.4 million (around US$23.3 million) by Sotheby's Hong Kong, October 2013 | The reigning auction record for the artist
Underlying the entire painting is this theme of anxiety, stress, and how humans seem to cope with change. This bears similarity to the famous Max Beckman painting The Night (1918-1919), but Zeng’s work is less chaotic and more haunting, with the almost photorealistic-looking background strongly contrasting the subjects in the foreground, giving a forced uniformity to the piece.
This all comes from a personal experience for Zeng, who moved to Beijing from his native city of Wuhan in 1993. He felt lost in the sprawling Chinese capital and the rapid changes in the ever-growing capitalistic consumption of the masses. He felt that everyone was wearing metaphorical masks of contradictions to simply survive in this evolving environment and that by transposing them onto a beach, there is a sort of contrast between the stress of the crowd and the idealism of the scenery they’re in.
Lot 811 | Wang Xingwei (b.1969) | Untitled (Flowerpot), Oil on canvas
Painted in 2009
240 x 200 cm
Provenance:
- Galerie Urs Meile, Lucerne
- Acquired from the above by the present owner
Estimate: RMB8,000,000-12,000,000 (around US$1.1-1.6 million)
Born in Shengyang, in Northern China, in 1969, Wang Xingwei subsequently moved to Beijing and then Shanghai in the 21st century and is part of China’s “85 New Wave” art movement. Coinciding with the country’s “opening up” to the world, the “85 New Wave” represented artists who were becoming increasingly exposed to Western art and adapting following the tumultuous period of the Cultural Revolution.
Painted in 2009, this work was featured in Wang’s solo exhibition in 2013 at Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing. It features as its central figure a woman whose head is replaced by a flowerpot. The painting is well lit up, and the way the woman is painted draws comparisons to work by Polish artist Tamara de Lempicka.
This replacement of a beautifully drawn woman’s head with different items is a common theme of Zeng’s work. In fact, the Wang’s auction record, Untitled (Watering Flowers) (2013) is of a male figure with the head of a watering pot sprinkling water on a female figure with a flower pot for a head that sold in November 2024 for RMB 23 million (around US$3.1 million). At its core, Wang started this focus by emphasizing the sitting female, but the incorporation of the strange gardening heads comes later on through an incorporation of surrealism.
Zeng Xingwei | Untitled (Watering Flowers) (2013), Oil on canvas | Sold for RMB 23 million (around US$3.1 million) by China Guardian Beijing, November 2024
The Surrealist aspect of this painting asks far more questions than it answers. In particular, when considering the recording-setting Untitled (Watering Flowers), the disappearance of the person who is doing the watering gives themes about isolation and abandonment of the flower-headed woman in the center of the painting. The painting further asks who will water the plants, the painter, the audience, or even herself, potentially pointing at themes of empathy or self-sufficiency.
Even with only a subject in this painting, there is always a theme of relationships. Whether that be between the watering pot and the flowers or the viewer and the subject, Wang carefully assembles a subtle narrative using simplistic symbols in bizarre ways.
Lot 825 | Kazuo Shiraga (1924-2008) | Outo Shoukou, Oil on canvas
Painted in 1966
161.8 x 130.5 cm
Provenance:
- Private collection, Japan
- Thence by descent to the previous owner
- Acquired from the above by the present owner
Estimate: RMB6,000,000-10,000,000 (around US$827,000-1.3 million)
Born in 1924 in Amagasaki outside Osaka, Kazuo Shiraga was a member of Japan’s Postwar Avant-Garde art scene known as Gutai. Using it he maximized his ability to explore new ideas by finding out how the spirit, body, and imagination created art, not as separate parts but as one entity. His work could be considered a form of performance art as he used his feet, as opposed to a brush, to spread paint using specific trajectories across a canvas meaning that his work looked like bold flashes of color and energy.
Shiraga described his process as “When action becomes an expression of consciousness, anything is possible. Expression is communicated by means of thought, and that is true whether it is formless, or given form through your physical actions.” This translated into bold swirls and hurricanes of color and strokes as he let go of any real thought process and let his feelings and body take control of the painting’s shape and design.
Kazuo Shiraga holding a rope as he used his feet to paint
Shiraga, along with various other artists, was a part of a Gutai art association that sought to find the limits of both traditional Japanese art while embracing Western art at the same time. Interestingly, they made use of many everyday materials such as lightbulbs, sand, water, and fabrics within their artwork, emphasizing the physicality of these items, while also incorporating performative aspects such as the foot painting of Shiraga.
This blending of art, performance, and the everyday was perhaps taken to its extreme by other Japanese artists such as Yayoi Kusama, who, while not avant-garde, did make use of physical materials such as fabric nets in her “Infinite Net” works and performance art while living in New York. However, while this movement may seem to be about letting loose on the canvas and experimentation, Shiraga more seemed to shift that control from a subjective artistic one to an objective natural style.
Other Highlighted Lots:
Lot 827 | Chu Teh-Chun (1920-2014) | Explosion celeste, Oil on canvas
Painted in 1986
100 x 81 cm
Provenance:
- Private collection, Europe
- Zhong Cheng Auction, 16 December 2018, lot 199
- Acquired at the above sale by the present owner
Estimate: RMB6,000,000-9,000,000 (around US$827,000-1.2 million)
Lot 838 | Yayoi Kusama (b. 1929) | Sunflower, Acrylic on canvas
Painted in 1988
45.5 x 38 cm
Provenance:
- Private collection, Asia
Estimate: RMB5,000,000-8,000,000 (around US$689,000-1.1 million)
Lot 815 | Jia Aili (b. 1979) | Throw Over to the Wasteland, Oil on canvas (diptych)
Painted in 2007
Each: 290 x 200 cm | Overall: 290 x 400 cm
Provenance:
- Platform China Contemporary Art Institute, Beijing
- Private collection (acquired from the above)
- Christie's Hong Kong, 28 November 2015, lot 56
- Acquired at the above sale by the present owner
Estimate: RMB3,800,000-5,800,000 (around US$524,000-799,000)
Lot 826 | Rhee Seundja (1918-2009) | La louve (The Wolf), Oil on canvas
Painted in 1963
130.4 x 97.1 cm
Provenance:
- Private collection
- Tajan Paris, 24 April 2012, lot 122
- Private collection
- K Auction Seoul, 20 June 2012, lot 8
- Acquired at the above sale by the present owner
Estimate: RMB2,800,000-4,800,000 ( around US$386,000-661,000)
Lot 853 | Raoul Dufy (1877-1953) | Le grand orchestre, Oil on canvas
Painted in 1942
66 x 82 cm
Provenance:
- Ali Khan
- Galerie Paul Pétrides, Paris, by 1958
- Anonymous sale, Millon & Associés, Paris, 2 December 1998, lot 50
- Weinstein Gallery, San Francisco
- Acquired from the above by the present owner on 25 August 2005
Estimate: RMB3,500,000-4,500,000 (around US$482,000-620,000)
Auction Details:
Auction House: Christie's Shanghai
Sale: 20th/2st Century Evening Sale
Date: 3 April 2025 | 6 pm (Shanghai Local Time)
Number of Lots: 53