Time to seek out that bit of old China, says ISABEL MORTON

IT’S ALL about China these days, I thought, as I scrutinised every item of blue and white china in my kitchen, while listening to radio reports of the Taoiseach’s visit to Shanghai and Beijing this week.

Ever since Chinese vice- president Xi Jinping visited Ireland a month or so ago, the nation has gone China-mad, in the hope that our new best friends will do business with us and save us from being sucked down the economic plughole.

Mind you, according to a recent article by economist David McWilliams, China had better watch out as, having had extraordinary growth over the past decade through exporting cheap goods to the West and lending money to America, it has now switched to lending at home, which has driven up the price of everything – including property.

And we know better than most that that particular course of action can only end in tears.

Meanwhile, just as many of our boom-time millionaires became increasingly nationalistic and bought up Irish silver, furniture and art, wealthy Chinese are now doing the same thing and repatriating their national artefacts.

Having just received notification of one of a series of lectures on Oriental art from Sheppard’s Auction House in Durrow, Co Laois, I was reminded of its ongoing connection with Chinese antiques.

Michael Sheppard told me that since the 18th century, when wealthy Westerners went on fashionable grand tours (extended cultural trips to far-flung places) many valuable items were brought back home as mementoes of their travels.

Whatever about these souvenirs, though, which, although lost to China, were in the main treasured and respected by their new owners, many other items were lost forever, having been looted and destroyed during the Sino-Japanese War, the Cultural Revolution and the ransacking of the Forbidden City.

So now, understandably, the Chinese are combing Western auction houses in search of the best of their manuscripts, porcelain, bronze, jade and cloisonné to repatriate them, if not actually back to China itself, then at least to the Chinese diaspora.

For Sheppard, who has had a lifelong fascination with China and a passion for all things Chinese, these items are very desirable at the moment.

This is unlike Japanese artefacts, which were fashionable a decade ago but, unless exceptional, might have difficulty selling today.

Sheppard’s auction house is dedicating a special day to auctioning Chinese items, as, with global interest, the auctioneer is obliged to slow down the proceedings to allow for the time-lag on phone and internet bids.

A recent example of this was in Sheppard’s sale earlier this month, when a Qing dynasty (1644-1911) cloisonné (metal work object decorated with enamel, gemstone and glass set into thin gold wire strips) zoomorphic (shaped in animal form) vase – in this case, shaped like a duck (sorry about all that but, having researched it I thought you might like to know) – had an estimate of €15,000-€25,000 but sold for the phenomenal figure of €120,000 (now I’ve got your attention) to a Chinese private collector in Los Angeles, US.

The auctioneer was later described as having shown no change of facial expression, as he moved on calmly from selling one item for €120,000 to the next for €50. But, as Sheppard said, “it was all going on inside” and he laughingly admitted to being “quite pleased” with the sale result.

The successful LA buyer never actually saw or handled the item before buying it and bid on the basis of condition reports, which provide detailed description and photographs with emphasis on signatures, markings and, most importantly, highlighting any apparent flaws.

Stuart Cole of James Adams, St Stephen’s Green, agrees that the Chinese market has “exploded in the last five years”, saying that as many Irish went out as missionaries to China, there are a lot of Chinese items in homes all around the country.

Last October, a blue and white 15th-century Ming dish came up for auction at Adams. It had been valued at between €2,000-€3,000 but caused consternation by selling for €310,000.

The vendors were from Co Derry and had inherited it from a family member who was stationed in China with the British army during the colonial era.

The dish depicted images of a five-claw dragon and was stamped with the very rare mark of the Emperor Xuande (1425-1435) and miraculously, after nearly 600 years, had only two hairline cracks.

Bought over the phone by a London dealer, it was no doubt sold on for a healthy profit to a specialist collector.

Cole has not come across many distressed sellers, nor has Adams been asked to value people’s private collections for bank security. In fact, he reported, “it’s harder to get good things now because there is less mobility in the market, as people are not downsizing”.

Nevertheless, with results like those recently achieved, many, like me, will be double-checking any items they own which look even remotely Chinese.

You just never know – we’ve all heard the one about the dog bowl.

Isabel Morton is a property consultant