I have a interesting idea for Taiwan. If the PRC won’t take back their artwork in exchange for a peace treaty, why not just sell it all to the highest bidder to buy weapons to defend this country from Chinese agression!
Or what about we blow up all of the artwork if they ever try to invade? Nah, sell it now…Are you listening Sotheby’s and Christies?
PS: I edited the subject from National Palace Museum to China Palace Museum, because I realized how politically loaded the name of that museum is. -September 13 17:00
[quote=“Hobart”]I have a interesting idea for Taiwan. If the PRC won’t take back their artwork in exchange for a peace treaty, why not just sell it all to the highest bidder to buy weapons to defend this country from Chinese agression!
Or what about we blow up all of the artwork if they ever try to invade? Nah, sell it now…Are you listening Sotheby’s and Christies?[/quote]
I like the idea of making a huge garage sale… They must have a lot, which is good, but not great enough to keep… After all the friends of Peanut got a lot of it hived off while the trove was on its multi-year migration from Beijing to Taipei.
Using the monies for weapons… good idea too. I guess that one famous painting could pay for a jet fighter… and a not so famous one for a hand gun.
Threatening to blow up the pile of loot, if the Chinese invade? Hmmm, them mainlanders commies might not give a hoot - after all they were hardly deferential against their cultural heritage from 1966 to 1976.
Sell it all!!! But before doing so, Taiwan should make replacement copies and proudly stamp them with “MADE VERY WELL IN TAIWAN”. This would be a good way to showcase the high quality of Taiwanese manufacturing.
Erh, I hate to break the news to you, but you’re too late - they already sold it off to cover losses from the stock market stabilization fund. I got suspicious when I visited the museum last year and noticed a Walmart price sticker on a 16th century Ming vase.
Don’t try to sell it all at once - the price will really drop a lot if they do that. They need to sell a few selected artworks each month, and they could coup quite a lot.
The NPM might not be the best museum concerning display etc., but it is, believe me I know, the best collection of Chinese art in the world.
Nobody, especially not the Mainlanders, would ever dare to nuke the NPM or the mountains surrounding it. In case you didn’t know, rumor has it that the mountains are all hollow and full of great treasures…
Great art is okay but unless you sell it you can’t really make much money from it. Let’s face the facts: there are not enough visitors to generate income. Vases, spoons. Not sexy at all!! With the DPP in power now is the time to break with this 5000 years of history bullshit.
And that is why I am working on a project with a well-connected Taiwanese company. We’re looking at an artifacts for pandas swap; long-term lease. Yes, no money need change hands. Taiwan returns some vases and Taiwan gets some pandas. These furry delights are sure to pull in the crowds, and there is a lot merchandising potential; toys, games etc. Some of the profits will be used for local conservation work, for less attractive animals that have no commercial value.
And with Taiwan’s push into bio-tech, there is plenty of government funding for projects such as the “Kanda” (in case you have not read about this, the “Kanda” is a plan to cross breed Koalas and Pandas).
Actually, the PRC has long been clamouring for the artifacts within the NPM to be returned. However, the traitorous running dogs in the DPP will not return them even though they advocate separatism. However, even should the queer desire to sell off historical treasures take root among the quisling nomenclature, they will be unlikely to do so except within private auctions on Taiwan itself as PRC pressure would most assuredly make any international auction impossible. Attemps to move them out of the country could possibly result in them being seized.
I don’t know what youa re getting at your stupid little twat, but you better consult a dictionary before posting.
The artifacts have never been in the possesion of the PRC. Any attempt to seize them would constitute theft. Moreover, several items have been on loan abroad, and they ahve always been returned in good order, despite the thieves in Beijing’s bluster.
Did you know that the most expensive real estate in the Taipei area is directly across the street from the Palace Museum? People will tell you it is all about fengshui as CKS’s experts chose that area as it is the best fengshui in Taipei. However, I believe it is because as you said Mesheel, not even goose stepping Red Guards would harm that repository of the greatest collection of Chinese art in the world.
Robert Storey said it best in the old Taiwan LP, that the National Palace museum is one of the 4 great museums of the world.
Again, if China won’t take the artwork back in exchange for a peace treaty, maybe after Taiwan sells it all to the highest bidders, they could offer to buy Taiwan. Let’s see how many pings are there in all of Taiwan? I guess you wouldn’t have to do that. Because the Chinese Communist Party members are actually a bunch of corrupt gangsters, Taiwan could just bribe them. How many corrupt gangsters are there running the country? 10,000? 100,000? Pay each of those guys US$10,000 or everyone in the whole country US$10.
Wow, and your going to vaste a few unreplacable vases for that? What does the world need “kandas” for!!! :loco:
Taiwanese, not including Aboriginese of couse, have a Chinese heritage, whether you like it or not. They are as proud of the treasures in the NPM as are the Mainlanders. Selling it would be the biggest mistake in the history of Taiwan… :fume:
The National Palace Museum has way too much stuff, and too much of it is the same KIND of stuff. Here’s what I think they should do.
(1) Change the name to “Imperial Palace Museum” or something else noncontroversial. (Nobody calls the Forbidden City the National Palace anymore.)
(2) Open branches in selected Chinese cities, other Asian cities, and areas with a Chinese diaspora. They could keep rotating their stuff on a twenty-year schedule, only this way the rotation would be from museum to museum.
Financing would be a problem, of course, particularly if they’d have to buy land in Tokyo or New York. Maybe they should work with existing museums instead for this…?
