A $30-million happy ending

Qianlong

A family who saw their dreams of a £43 million windfall disappear after the auction of their Chinese vase went wrong, are finally getting their due. Tony Johnson and his mother Gene thought they had sold the 18th-century piece back in 2010. A Chinese billionaire bid £43 million but balked at paying the auctioneer fees, which would have brought the price to a record £51.6  million.

Peter Bainbridge, who owns the provincial auction house that “sold” the vase, tried to save the deal by negotiating with the buyer but with no success. After a two-year stalemate, the international auctioneer Bonhams was approached by an interested party to broker a deal. The unidentified buyer from the Far East is believed to have paid up to £25 million for the vase, the bulk of the money going to the Johnson family.

The 16-inch porcelain vase was made for the Chinese emperor Qianlong, who ruled from 1736 to 1795. It was looted from the Imperial Summer Palace during raids by the British and French in 1860. Johnson, 56, from the Isle of Wight, and his elderly mother inherited it from her late sister, Patricia Newman, in January 2010. It had belonged to Patricia’s late husband who had in turn inherited it from an uncle who brought it back from China.

The object attracted great interest from Chinese bidders at the auction in November 2010 where it sold for 40 times its estimate before the dispute erupted. Ivan Macquisten, the editor of Antiques Trades Gazette, called the object “one of the finest pieces ever made in China.”

SOURCE: "Couple’s broken dreams over Chinese vase have a £20 million happy ending" January 16, 2013.