Displaying items by tag: vase

Last Saturday, a hapless museum-goer was taking in the ancient exhibits at the Heraklion Archaeological Museum on the Greek island of Crete, when she suddenly tripped and fell. In doing so she, grabbed onto a 4,000 year-old Minoan vase to break her fall and shamefully smashed the prehistoric artifact, the "Daily Mail" reports.

The Greek Culture Ministry said the culprit suffered minor injuries to her legs, while the vase on the other hand, was completely destroyed. Restorers at the institution are optimistic, however.

Chinese billionaire Liu Yiqian is known to set record prices at art auctions worldwide. At a Sotheby’s sale in Hong Kong on Tuesday, the Shanghai-based Liu proved himself once again.

This time, he bought a Southern Song dynasty-era (1127-1279) vase for 113.9 million Hong Kong dollars ($ 14.7 million). The price is one of the highest ever paid at an auction for a ceramic vase of that period. The crackled bluish-green artifact is part of the Guan Yao, or official ware created for the imperial court of that time.

The leadership of the Archaeological Institute of America (AIA) has once again condemned the St Louis chapter of its organization for consigning artifacts to auction. Held by the society since 1911-12, the two objects, a Mayan vase from Quiriqua in Honduras (est £3,800-£5,000) and a Zapotec urn from Monte Alban, Mexico (est £1,900-£3,100) are due to be sold at Bonhams, New York, on 12 November. Last month, the group put up its “Harageh Treasure” of Egyptian artifact for auction at Bonhams London, but the collection was pulled at the last minute and privately acquired by the Metropolitan Museum of Art for an undisclosed sum.

A painting by Post-Impressionist artist Henri Rousseau was stolen from Germany’s Museum Charlotte Zander on October 3rd, according to reports by the dpa. The Museum Charlotte Zander is located in the Schloss Bönningheim, in the same-named town around 40 kilometers north of Stuttgart.

The unnamed work was slipped from its frame during normal opening hours on the national holiday (German Unity Day). It is said to be worth in the realm of €50,000 ($63,500). The painting reportedly depicts a vase holding a large bouquet of flowers and was hanging in a gallery along with other works by Rousseau.

A monumental Fencai Imperial Qing Dynasty vase auctioned for $24.7 million at Skinner last night, setting a record as the top grossing lot ever sold in New England, and topping all sales of Qing Dynasty vases in the U.S. The Skinner "Asian Works of Art" auction coincides with Asia Week, and this vase has surpassed all other objects sold during the event to date.

An intensely focused and enthusiastic crowd packed the auction room, and most rose to their feet as the vase soared past the $10 million mark. After spirited bidding from multiple bidders present in the room and participating by phone, the hammer fell to a round of applause.

As part of a deal with prosecutors, the man accused of smashing a vase by the Chinese artist Ai Weiwei in a museum here pleaded guilty Wednesday to criminal mischief but avoided any more jail time beyond the two days he spent behind bars after his arrest.

Maximo Caminero, a 51-year-old artist from the Dominican Republic, will be on probation for 18 months and serve 100 hours of community service by teaching children how to paint. Mr. Caminero also must pay restitution of $10,000, the appraised value of the vase he dropped on the floor of the Pérez Art Museum Miami on Feb. 16 in what he said was a political act.

A Ming Dynasty wine cup sold for $36.05 million at Sotheby’s in Hong Kong on Tuesday, April 8, breaking the world auction record for Chinese porcelain. The tiny porcelain cup, which features a color painting of a rooster and a hen tending to their chicks, was purchased by the Shanghai-based financier, Liu Yiqian, by telephone bid.

The previous record for Chinese porcelain was set in 2010 when a gourd-shaped vase from the Qianlong period sold for $32.58 million. The chicken cup also surpassed the previous world record for Ming Dynasty porcelain, which was set in 2011 by a blue and white vase that brought more than $21 million. Nicolas Chow, deputy chairman of Sotheby’s Asia, said, “There is no more legendary object in the history of Chinese porcelain. This is an object bathed in mythology.”

The chicken cup was created during the reign of the Chenghua Emperor between 1465 and 1487, a period known for its exceptional porcelain. A number of later emperors were so enamored by the chicken cup’s design that they commissioned numerous copies. There are less than 20 such cups in existence, with only four in private collections. Yiqian’s cup is the only genuine chicken cup in China.

An ornately decorated 18^th century Chinese porcelain vase sold for a record-setting $83 million in London on November 11, 2010. The vase, which was made for the Qianlong Emperor, soared past its presale estimate and became the highest-selling Asian work of art ever offered at auction. However, the original buyer failed to pay for the vase and the piece is now being sold for less than half its record-setting price.  

The vase’s owners, Tony Johnson, a retired lawyer, and his mother, Gene, have held on to the work for over two years after the original sale without seeing a profit. Johnson and his mother recently found another buyer for the vase, which will sell for an undisclosed amount believed to be between $32.1 million and $40.2 million. The London-based auction house Bonhams helped facilitate the sale.

The recent price tag is much more sensible for the Qing-dynasty vase, which features a reticulated body painted in the famille rose palette. The sale of Chinese art and antiquities peaked in 2010, leading to a number of major sales that were not always realized. The demand for Chinese works of art has since leveled off.

The Toledo Museum of Art in Ohio returned a ceramic water vase, which depicts the Greek god, Dionysus turning pirates into dolphins, to the Italian government on Tuesday, January 9, 2013. The jug, which dates back to the sixth century BC, was likely looted from Italian soil years ago.

The Toledo Museum of Art purchased the jug in 1982 from art dealers who used falsified documents to hide the object’s dishonest past. Investigators revealed that the jug was smuggled out of Italy after it was illegally excavate sometime before 1981.

The United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency announced that the Estruscan black-figure kalpis, which is valued at $665,000, was handed back to Italian officials following a ceremony held at the museum. While Italy currently holds reign over the work, the jug will remain on view in the museum’s Libbey Court until it leaves for Rome in late summer of this year.