Ming-era 'chicken cup' fetches record $36 mil.
A Ming Dynasty wine cup broke the world auction record for Chinese porcelain in Hong Kong on Tuesday, after it was bought for $36.05 million by Shanghai tycoon Liu Yiqian, Sotheby's said, as reported by AFP.
The tiny white porcelain cup, decorated with a color painting of a rooster and a hen tending to their chicks, was made during the reign of the Chenghua Emperor between 1465 and 1487.
The sale set a record for Chinese porcelain, according to the auction house, beating the $32.58 million paid for a gourd-shaped vase from the Qianlong period in 2010.
It also far exceeded the previous world record for Ming Dynasty porcelain, which was set by a blue and white vase that fetched HK$168.66 million in 2011.
Nicolas Chow, deputy chairman of Sotheby's Asia, described the cup as the "holy grail" of Chinese art.
"There is no more legendary object in the history of Chinese porcelain. This is an object bathed in mythology," he told reporters after the sale.
"It has gone to an extraordinarily good home in Shanghai in the collection of Liu Yiqian."
Bidding started at $22 million, with Liu making the winning offer by telephone after a lengthy battle among hopeful buyers.
Liu, a taxi-driver turned financier now aged 50, is one of China's wealthiest men and among the country's new class of super-rich scouring the globe for artwork.
He is worth an estimated $1.6 billion and has two museums to his name.
Liu made headlines in the art world when he bought a Song-era scroll for $8.2 million at a Sotheby's auction in New York in September, only to have it dismissed as a fake by experts. He stands by its authenticity.
Liu made his first fortune speculating in Shanghai's newly established stock market in the 1990s, but now runs a huge conglomerate active in several industries.