La Bella at Marella

"There are different types of collectors: those who buy for investments, those who buy for aesthetic pleasure and those who have a real interest." -- Eleonora Battiston

An opening night at the Marella is usually a big spread. So it was recently when the Beijing gallery opened a show of young Chinese artists which mixed irreverent social commentary with ceramic breasts and other human forms. Marella usually makes the biggest splash among the dozen or so openings every Saturday at Beijing’s redbrick 798 art colony in the city’s northerly Dashanzi district.

Onlookers gawked as artists, media and collectors spilled onto the footpath with paper cups of Italian wine and plates of hors d’oeuvres at the recent opening party for Fancy Dream, a collection of works by young Chinese artists shown by the Marella, an Italian-owned art firm with galleries in Milan and Beijing.

Choosing and curating the exhibits at Marella, Bologna-born Battiston, 28, was on hand to show the curious and the critics around. Keen to point out special works, Battiston is a strikingly beautiful, statuesque Italian whose intense, intelligent gaze seems to dissect each work as she moves through the gallery offering potted histories of artists and explanations of their works to those who approach with queries. Many are acquaintances, and it’s easy to spot the artists themselves, shy figures in black with long hair, shaved heads, goatees and long, wispy beards.

Battiston, who writes scholarly articles treatises on Chinese art in her spare time, specialized in Chinese Art History when she took Oriental Studies at Bologna University. "In 1998 I started to travel in China and to attend language and culture courses for my research." By 2002, after a longer period in Beijing, she had established contact with many local contemporary artists. "I went back to Italy and I found that the only Italian Gallery that was working in a strong way with Chinese artists was Marella Gallery in Milan. I went there to see an exhibition and I proposed to the owners to collaborate with them."

A two year stint curating shows and developing an eye for talent at Marella in Milan was punctuated by frequent trips to China, seeking new talent worth cultivating for Marella. But the Chinese art scene was growing so fast and interest from collectors so strong that Marella decided to open a permanent space in Beijing. Now, three years as director at Marella Gallery in Beijing, aside from running Marella, she’s got a sideline writing texts for catalogues, contributing articles on contemporary art for renowned Italian and international contemporary art magazines including Flash Art, Zoom and Segno. "I collaborate on books published by Damiani (Italian publisher)and I published a book titled Bamboo in Chinese Painting," explains Battiston in her glass-walled, book-lined office attached to the Marella in Dashanzi.

For those so inclined there’s enough free wine and finger food in Beijing to sate even the most ravenous culture vulture. But the quality of the art doesn’t always match the ample amounts of wine and cheese. Many galleries at Dashanzi have been known to open a new exhibition of work shown at other galleries earlier and simply marked up. The works of several artists hang, grocery shop-style, on the walls of several galleries neighboring the Marella. Battiston isn’t worried about the competition. Just as in many sectors of the Chinese economy, contemporary art, having proven itself profitable, has drawn its share of speculators and impostors. Some artists have turned dealers. "There are intelligent and art-minded gallery owners, as much as simply commercially-minded people. There are all kinds here now."

In the international market, Chinese art is a new area of interests and investments

- Battiston

The competition doesn’t worry Battiston: the quality of its art distinguishes Marella from them. "I don’t think we have to be scared of financial risks because our work is not based on a week plan but on years of experience and research… I think Marella Gallery has already achieved very good results on the local and international art scene, not just in terms of business but also for the promotion of artists and of the gallery itself. We are stimulated to grow more and more." Even though, the number of galleries in Dashanzi has multiplied, and so too the art buying public. "In China nowadays there are more and more crowds of people gathering together for art venues, openings and art fairs, especially when we have such a location as good as ours in 798."

True, the Marella stands opposite a row of cafes at the eastern end of 798, fronting onto the main, original block of galleries which were first to emerge from the machine-turning factories which up to recently occupied this Bauhaus complex of red bricks. The cafes are owned by artists who made good off an art scene much-fancied by foreign and, increasingly, domestic collectors.

Judging by recent auctions most of the recent buying has been by Chinese collectors. All 94 canvasses sold for a total of nearly RMB 20 million at China Guardian’s first ever auction of contemporary paintings. "Positive yet rational market sentiments" was the expression used by Guardian to describe the demand. Modern art has already gone mainstream, judging by Guardian prices. Wang Mingming’s Landscape sold for RMB 1.11 million but bidding was fiercest for a painting by the late Chen Yifei’s One Sunny Day. It sold for RMB 4.4 million, the highest price for the session.

Battiston has found homes and fame for some of the most cutting edge Chinese art. Marella artist Wang Wei, an artist featured in the Fancy Dream show, has had his work purchased and displayed by Deutsche Bank. Much of the current feverish interest in Chinese modern art is driven by hype about ever-powerful China and Eastern exoticism. But how long can that hype last? "In the international market, this is a new area of interests and investments in Chinese art. I think the international attention will be focused on this market for at least another couple of years, then the situation will find its stability and a natural selection will happen in order to let skilful artists be affirmed and set their positions in the history of contemporary Chinese art."

There’s been plenty of debate about how much of the contemporary work coming out of China is Chinese rather than a local manifestation of Western modern art. "I wouldn’t talk of ‘copying’, because it’s a commonplace and every individual has got his own personality and ideas to express. High level artists are just a small part. There are mediocre artists who are taking advantage of the situation, but I wouldn’t say they’re ‘copying’ ancient values or Western art."

Foreigners look for something exotic or for something reminder of what they have already seen or experienced.

- Battiston

For every Wang Mingming or Wang Wei there are dozens of lower value works. After the wave of late-1990s Chinese art integrated communist social realism with icons of western consumerism. Some Chinese contemporary artists have been accused of mass producing work which appeals to the tastes of foreign buyers. "Probably, some artists try to give people what people are looking for. Foreigners look for something exotic or for something reminder of what they have already seen or experienced. But this is just a part of the artists. There are very skilful and capable people that work independently from the attempt to appeal foreign buyers’ tastes…We can’t oversimplify in this way. We should look at the artist or at the technique."

A lack of good critics in China has been blamed for the profusion of third-grade art. Complaints that local critics are often too close to artists are unfair however, says Battiston. "Its art criticism is not as advanced as the Western one. There are good Chinese critics, but for them it’s quite hard to collaborate with Western magazines because of the language barrier. There are instead a few outstanding foreign critics that live in China and have thus a complete and more direct impact on what is happening now."