IF someone took away what belonged to you, the last thing you’d want to do is buy it back.

This simple logic also applies to the Chinese government’s attitude towards the upcoming auction in Paris of its long-lost relics, two invaluable bronze statuettes of a rat and rabbit from Yuanmingyuan, or the Old Summer Palace.

Song Xinchao, director of the museum sector at the State Administration of Cultural Heritage, said that China would not use “its own money” to buy back “its own things.”

Christie’s, an international arts dealer and auctioneer based in Hong Kong, announced recently that the two statuettes would be auctioned in Paris in February. They have an estimated combined worth of over 200 million yuan (US$28.6 million).

An effort by a Chinese nongovernment fund to stop the figures from being auctioned in Paris has failed. They are now being exhibited at a pre-auction exhibition in New York.

The rat and rabbit are two of the 12 animals in the Chinese zodiac. The others are the ox, tiger, dragon, snake, horse, sheep, monkey, rooster, dog and pig. Originally the two figures were part of a set of 12 that formed a famous fountain in the palace garden. They spouted water in turn to mark the various hours of the day with the exception of midday, when an elaborate hydraulic mechanism triggered all of the animals simultaneously. The fountain was destroyed, along with the whole royal garden, by colonial invaders in the late Qing Dynasty during the Opium War (1839-1842).

Auction denounced as daylight robbery

According to a BBC report last Sunday, a special mainland fund, set up to help retrieve long-lost Chinese national treasures, attempted to negotiate the return of the figures with the French collector Yves Saint Laurent, a world-famous fashion designer, in 2003 and 2004.

However, the designer wanted US$20 million.

“This is no different from robbery!” Zong Tianliang, spokesman with the Yuanmingyuan garden administration, said to a reporter from the International Herald Tribune. The repurchasing plan was aborted over the price dispute.

In June 2008 Saint Laurent died, leaving his collection, including the two figures from China, to a European fund, which decided to sell them through Christie’s.

In a telephone interview with the Oriental Morning Post, Wang Jia, Christie’s operations manager in China, said Christie’s operates legally between collectors and buyers.

However, Christie’s auction plan has stirred heated debate and outrage in China. Online comments denounced it as daylight robbery, adding unacceptable insult to the injury. Others wondered if there was still any possibility of retrieving the national treasures through negotiations.

Deaf ears to the escalating chaos

Song warned the public of possible speculation by business dealers driving up the auction prices, with the aim of exploiting Chinese patriotic sentiments in retrieving their national treasures.

“The best reaction to this incident is to turn deaf ears to the chaos,” Song said to a Xinhua reporter. He also recommended restraint in the media coverage.

Escalating national patriotism pushed previous auctions of the ox, monkey, and tiger figures up to prices as high as HK$7 million, HK$8.18 million and HK$15.44 million, respectively. They were all purchased by mainland giant China Poly Group.

In September 2007, Macao entrepreneur Stanley Ho bought the horse figure at a record price of HK$69.1 million before the auction started and declared he would donate it to the Chinese Government.

National treasures are being retrieved but at a costly price.

Zong expressed his concern over the trend of wildly escalating prices in the auction market, especially for the Yuanmingyuan relics. “The 200 million yuan (asked by Christie’s) is no doubt beyond the reach of any ordinary institutions and individuals. This kind of craziness does no good to the relics themselves or the culture they bear,” he said.

The only exception so far was the pig figure, which was returned to China in 2003 without any involvement of auction companies. After much negotiation, the special mainland fund finally persuaded an American collector to transfer it, at a cost of about US$1 million.

Repurchasing remains the norm

Repurchasing remains the mainstream method in relics retrieval, other than donation or demand.

The donation of relics relies solely on the holder’s consciousness and ethical principles.

Demanding the return of relics sounds reasonable according to an international treaty that mandates relics plundered during the colonial wars be returned to their homeland. However, the treaty fails to impose any practical rules on nonmember states like Great Britain and America, which actually hold large numbers of Chinese relics taken during wars.

Despite the Chinese Government’s strong resistance to buying back national treasures, repurchasing by unofficial Chinese parties remains the norm. Nongovernmental buyers mainly consist of social groups and institutions as well as a few wealthy individuals.

So far, five of the 12 animal figures have been returned to China. The rat and rare will probably be the last two appearing on the market. The remaining five — dragon, snake, sheep, rooster and dog — may have been destroyed in warfare or lost forever, experts suspect.

(SD-Agencies)