Obviously, the Xiao Yuan case involves the legal protection of art collections. Based on the newly revised "Cultural Relics Protection Law of the People's Republic of China", it is found that there are many connections with this case.

Jade jade cabbage carving, Qing Dynasty, collected by the National Palace Museum in Taipei

Insight into the legal protection of collected art works from the "Xiao Yuan case"

Text/Fan Meijun

Editor Wen Shi

Abstract: In July 2015, Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts Library Former curator Xiao Yuan was tried for using fakes to package 143 paintings by famous people in the collection. Obviously, such bad things are not unique, but worry or anger will not solve the problem. We need to think about some solutions, such as legal protection and system construction. Obviously, the Xiao Yuan case involves the legal protection of art collections. Based on the newly revised "Cultural Relics Protection Law of the People's Republic of China", it is found that there are many connections with this case. If we take this as an opportunity to refer to some collection examples and do some legal construction, thereby forming a comprehensive legal and management pressure, it will not just be a matter of making up for the situation.

Keywords : Xiao Yuan Art Collection Law

On July 21, 2015, Xiao Yuan, the former director of the Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts Library, was tried in the Guangzhou Intermediate Court. Prosecutors accused him of substituting fakes for 143 paintings by famous people such as Qi Baishi and Zhang Daqian. Among them, 125 were entrusted and auctioned for a total of more than 30 million yuan, while the remaining paintings were estimated to be worth more than 70 million yuan. The case received widespread attention, and I was interviewed by Art Newspaper over the phone on the train on my way out.

Obviously, such bad things are not unique, and people can't help but worry about the safety of state-owned art works that have artistic and cultural relic value and have been collected by public cultural institutions. However, worry or anger does not solve the problem. You have to think about some solutions, such as legal protection, system construction, etc. The basic principles of our country's legal system construction are: there are laws to abide by, laws must be followed, law enforcement must be strict, and violations must be prosecuted. The "Xiao Yuan Case" involves the legal protection of art collections. The author has carefully reviewed the revised version of the "Cultural Relics Protection Law of the People's Republic of China" (hereinafter referred to as the "Cultural Relics Protection Law") passed by the third meeting of the 12th National People's Congress Standing Committee on June 29, 2013. Cultural Heritage Protection Law (the following detailed rules are all quoted from this law), it was found that there was no legal loophole in this case that could not be followed, but that problems in understanding and management led to non-compliance with the law and lax enforcement of the law.

Zhou Sicong and Lu Shen’s “Gate to Hell” and “Leaving Home” composition drafts on paper and pencil, 15.6×54.3cm, no year, collected by Beijing Academy of Fine Arts

1. “Xiao Yuan” is not an exception

Xiao Yuan said that when he was the director of the library The phenomenon of subcontracting works before and after has existed for a long time. It should be said that such self-defeating behavior is not an isolated case.

Coincidentally, Hu, a staff member of a university library in Beijing, made nearly 1.2 million yuan by stealing and selling ancient books in the collection. Early in the morning on June 30, 2015, the police seized a total of 238 sets of more than 500 ancient books from the balcony and wardrobe of his home. In order not to reveal her flaws, she took out all the book seals on the covers of ancient books without any professional respect, and her method was more insidious than Xiao Yuan. The direct evidence why Xiao Yuan was reported by his alumni was the label on the scroll. Hu said that all this was due to his lack of professional qualifications, so he "got a few health care, beauty and weight loss cards, and spent more than 400,000 yuan." The reason is very legitimate! No matter how bright Hu's face is, even if he applies two bottles of essence worth tens of thousands of dollars at a time, it can't cover up his poor professionalism and despicable personality.

html I watched the news on TV more than 4 years ago. A middle-aged man was caught reselling Duan Inkstones in a square in Beijing. He was actually the director of a certain cultural management department. This guy was so cute. He actually took the company’s collection and went to the streets to sell takeaways. Professional explanation Something like that. Maybe he had good reasons: he didn't get the post of deputy director and he was in a bad mood recently. A professor of modern and contemporary literature said in class that he had just discovered a strange little book in the library, priced at only a few cents, and decided to pay several times the price to "legally" possess it. Suddenly, I felt that this person was extremely shameless!

The "Cultural Preservation Law" clearly stipulates the legal liability for similar acts:

Article 44 It is prohibited for state-owned cultural relics collection units to donate, lease or sell the collection of cultural relics to other units or individuals.

Article 49 Staff members of cultural relics administrative departments and state-owned cultural relics collection units may not borrow state-owned cultural relics or illegally appropriate state-owned cultural relics.

Article 64 Anyone who violates the provisions of this law and commits any of the following acts, which constitutes a crime, shall be investigated for criminal responsibility in accordance with the law:

(3) Selling cultural relics in state-owned collections without authorization or privately giving them to non-state-owned units or individuals;

Illegal acts must Anyone who violates the law must be held accountable to maintain the dignity of the law. Obviously, Xiao Yuan not only broke the law but also committed a crime. His despicable method of replacing a civet cat with a prince was not something a gentleman would do. As far as collections of art are concerned, the harm caused by external theft is never as great as internal theft, which is very sad. Many years ago, a theft occurred at an art academy. More than a hundred items from the collection were stolen from famous artists, which seemed to be a very good thing. At present, there is still some controversy over whether the applicable law in Xiao Yuan's case is "crime of theft" or "crime of official embezzlement." According to my country's "Criminal Law", the crime of theft refers to the act of secretly stealing public or private property; and the crime of official embezzlement refers to the crime of personnel of a company, enterprise or other unit taking advantage of their position to illegally appropriate the property of the unit for themselves, and the amount is relatively large. Big act. If convicted of the crime of theft, he will be sentenced to fixed-term imprisonment of more than 10 years or life imprisonment; if found guilty of official embezzlement, he will be sentenced to more than 5 years of fixed-term imprisonment.

Sketch of "Leaving Home" by Zhou Sicong and Lu Chen, pencil on paper, 79×109cm, no year, collected by Beijing Academy of Fine Arts

2. Ownership and custody of collections

As far as I know, many public institutions have some stocks of modern and contemporary calligraphy and paintings , most of them were left over from PEN Club exchanges or given away free of charge. Some are now in dilapidated condition after being mounted on the wall, and some are randomly locked in cabinets in the office without a special storage room or even accounts. A certain university has works by famous artists such as Zhang Daqian, Huang Binhong , Huang Junbi , etc. It used to be that students majoring in Chinese painting could borrow them from across the classroom, but now it is basically impossible. In order to spread the risk, many works are assigned to teachers for safekeeping. In fact, this is quite risky. What should I do if it is damaged or lost? And this kind of thing has happened in reality.

Perhaps in the eyes of some people, art collections in public institutions only belong to “units” or “leaders”. In fact, they belong to the state, and the collection institution is only the custodian. The "Cultural Protection Law" stipulates: Article 2: Within the territory of the People's Republic of China, the following cultural relics are protected by the state: (4) Important documents and materials of various eras in history, as well as manuscripts and book materials with historical, artistic and scientific value, etc. ;

Article 5... The following movable cultural relics belong to the state:

(2) Cultural relics collected and kept by state-owned cultural relics collection units and other state agencies, military forces, state-owned enterprises, and public institutions;

movable cultural relics that belong to the state The ownership of cultural relics will not be changed by the termination or change of the unit in which they are kept or collected.

The ownership of state-owned cultural relics is protected by law and cannot be infringed.

The art market has been very hot in recent years, and these works are naturally a huge fortune. Regardless of economic value, these collections are physical objects with research value in the history of modern art. The academic harm after being stolen and exchanged will be serious. A friend studied Huang Binhong and learned that the Guizhou Provincial Museum has four important collections. He couldn't help but look at the museum with admiration. What if they were stolen and replaced? Therefore, when the "Ten Gates" were revealed in the Forbidden City, the anger of the Chinese people was understandable.

The serious problem at the moment is that many collections of public institutions have not been collected, and the ownership of property rights has not been clearly defined. For example, 30 years ago, several famous calligraphers and painters went to a certain art academy for exchanges. Who would own the works they left behind? Who registers and keeps the records, and who is responsible for keeping them? The mandatory provisions of the Cultural Preservation Law are:

Article 36 Museums, libraries and other cultural relics collection units must distinguish the levels of cultural relics in their collections, set up collection files, establish a strict management system, and report to the competent cultural relics authorities. Administrative department filing.

The cultural relics administrative departments of the local people's governments at or above the county level shall establish archives of cultural relics in their respective administrative regions; the cultural relics administrative department of the State Council shall establish archives of national first-level cultural relics collections and archives of cultural relics collected by the state-owned cultural relics collection units under their jurisdiction.

It can be seen that this type of collection has "laws to follow" in terms of archiving, management and filing, but it is hard to say whether "laws must be followed". If management is not strict, all kinds of covert frauds and thefts will surely emerge in endlessly. The fact that collections are not registered or made public may be related to the private interests of some collection institutions. Some collections of great academic value are kept secret to ensure that the unit produces results. On July 29, 2015, Beijing Academy of Fine Arts Art Museum held the "Elegy of Great Love - Research Exhibition of Zhou Sicong and Lu Chen's "Miner Pictures"". This is a large-scale exhibition organized by the recipient organization after the descendants of Zhou Sicong and Lu Chen donated the "Miner Pictures" series and drafts to the Beijing Academy of Fine Arts. It not only commemorates the two artists, but also declares to the society that these collections will be better received. Good save. Future art history research will not necessarily be in libraries, let alone seminars, but in museums, archives, art galleries and other places where there are "things". For example, when studying Lin Fengmian, you wouldn't just download a few pictures from the Internet and analyze them, right?

Zhou Sicong's "Study Manuscripts of Leaving Hometown", ink and color on paper, 69.3×52cm, 1978

3. Examples and inspirations from collections

Compared with the poor protection of art collections by some domestic institutions, some good practices in the industry are worth learning from, such as strict systems , strict management, public supervision, etc. Of course, we must also talk about professional ethics.

Taipei’s National Palace Museum protects cultural relics and is the conscience of the industry. In 2007, the public discovered that a hair-thin long beard on the head of the katydid in the collection "Jade Cabbage" was broken by one centimeter, and they suspected that it was broken during the previous exhibition in Kaohsiung. Suddenly, the Forbidden City became the target of public criticism, and they had to use various documents, photos and data to prove their innocence. Later, they found out that it had been broken at least when the Nigensha Shrine in Japan was taking pictures in 1969, and they breathed a sigh of relief. In November 2011, "The Bund" published an article "Exclusive interview with Taipei Palace Museum Director Zhou Gongxin: 'The Palace Museum must not just provide privileges to a few people.'" In the article, Ji Ruoxin, director of the Museum's Registration and Preservation Department and Security Management Department, told reporters : The inventory of cultural relics started in 1989. Except for a page of paper and a packet of salt, all 2,972 boxes of cultural relics shipped from the mainland to Taiwan were recorded. One page contained the autopsy report and nude scene of a female corpse from the Ming Dynasty. The Qing Dynasty reused this piece of paper to record the war at that time. A packet of salt was lake salt that was brought as tribute from Xinjiang during the Qing Dynasty. After all the evaporation, only the wrapping paper was left, and it could only be written off after approval.

On a TV show, Zhou Gongxin responded angrily to the rumors that some politicians had secretly taken possessions from the Forbidden City collection: There is no such thing! National treasures have gone through a lot of hardships when moving from place to place. When a country is facing a life-and-death moment, each cultural relic may be the most direct evidence of the survival of a national culture. The story of the older generation of Forbidden City residents guarding national treasures is very moving. Their sense of mission may be lacking in those today who neglect their duties or even commit theft due to lack of professional titles and low remuneration.

In 1902, Ding Long, a Chinese laborer who worked as a servant in the United States, donated all his savings of US$12,000 in the hope of establishing a sinology department at an American university to spread Chinese culture. Its owner, General Carpentier (1824-1918), successively donated nearly 500,000 US dollars, it became the East Asian Department of Columbia University which is now the center of Chinese studies. Cixi and the "Integrated Ancient and Modern Books " donated by officials of the Qing Dynasty and other documents are still well preserved and have become cultural relics in themselves. This kind of reverence for foreign cultures is so embarrassing to those in China who waste, steal, sell or even destroy collections! ?

In addition, the protection of Chinese cultural relics by some foreign collection institutions is also worth learning from. On June 22, 1900, the Dunhuang Buddhist Scripture Cave was discovered. After reporting it to the authorities, there was no toll for transportation to the provincial capital.As we all know, a large number of cultural relics were later given to foreign cultural robbers by Wang Taoist, the actual housekeeper at the time, in a half-sold, half-given way. Later, the officials finally agreed to send the cultural relics to Beijing, but there were countless damages caused by wild geese plucking them during the journey. And those cultural relics taken away by foreigners are still intact in a constant temperature and humidity environment. Therefore, "I hate it so much!" Yu Qiuyu asked: "In such a huge China, there are not many volumes of scriptures! Compared with the situation of being abused by officials, sometimes I even want to say cruelly: I would rather store it in the London Museum of !”[1]

Undoubtedly, the Chinese people’s indifference and greed for cultural relics cannot be solved from the moral, rational and educational levels in the short term. They have to rely on the lowest moral bottom line-the law, which is also mandatory. of high-voltage lines. The crime and punishment are statutory, and under normal circumstances, the case will eventually have a legal conclusion. On December 23, 2016, Xiao Yuan died of illness while on bail awaiting trial. The Guangzhou Intermediate People's Court ruled that the case should be terminated in accordance with the Criminal Procedure Law, but it still attracted attention on WeChat and other media. Compared with the power of the "Criminal Law", I feel that the "Cultural Preservation Law" is a little weak, and mostly contains some "ordering corrections" provisions. Drunk driving was not a big deal in the past, but in Singapore it was caning. It is only now that it has been punished that it has attracted the attention of the people. Of course, publicity, education, and moral self-discipline will never go out of style.

Zhou Sicong and Lu Chen's "Miner's Picture", partially ink and color on paper, 68.5×68.5cm, 1981, collected by Beijing Academy of Fine Arts

4. Legal intervention in trouble

Many public institutions have collections, but some have not even been inventoried . Therefore, these collections may face the danger of "loss of state-owned assets" like the Xiao Yuan case. What should we do?

In the author’s opinion, action should be taken in accordance with relevant laws and regulations. The Cultural Preservation Law stipulates:

Article 75 Anyone who commits any of the following acts shall be ordered to make corrections by the cultural relics administrative department of the people’s government at or above the county level:

(5) Cultural Relics The collection unit fails to establish archives and management systems for cultural relics in accordance with relevant national regulations, or fails to record archives and management systems for cultural relics;

Therefore, it is recommended that institutions with art collections first clean, photograph, number and register the works to confirm the works After ownership is reported to the competent department for classification and filing, the collection can be stamped with a collection seal and a catalog published. Finally, management rules will be formulated and a dedicated person will be responsible for safekeeping. Valuables can be sent to a bank safe. In addition, all or part of the collection can be displayed online for supervision.

Undoubtedly, condemnation and legal sanctions for self-theft are not enough. A sound management and supervision mechanism is required. After all, just by secretly exchanging a painting, ordinary people may not be able to earn hundreds of millions of dollars after working for several lifetimes. Not everyone can resist such a temptation. It should be said that the Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts Library has a lending system, but in the face of individual selfish desires or the tacit group selfish desires, the system may be ineffective. Ma Weidu said in an interview with CCTV's "News 1+1": "Acquaintances" make it difficult for some small and medium-sized museums to implement the system. What's more, Director Xiao is in charge of all keys and can exchange them at will just like searching for items in his own house.

After Xiao Yuan’s case was revealed, various cynicism or excuses were made, but in fact they had no practical effect. The death of Sun Zhigang in Guangzhou has abolished an inexplicable detention and repatriation system. Can Xiao Yuan's case attract the attention of "contemporaries" and lead to the creation of a new law or local regulations that are beyond the reach of the Cultural Protection Law? If it is really introduced and the protection of art collections becomes strict and standardized, then Xiao Yuan will be recorded in the history of the rule of law like Sun Zhigang, and his personal prison will have greater social value. Can the relevant departments provide some help?

In addition, it is recommended to publish a picture album, in which all 143 original paintings and stolen fakes are published with a brief introduction to the case. This is not only a textbook on calligraphy and painting appraisal, but also a legal warning.

Ding Long (1857-1936)

Conclusion

In the face of interests, the so-called conscience, ability and professional ethics are often vulnerable. The case was finally settled when the suspect died of illness, and jail time for similar perpetrators may not be the best and final outcome of the law. If this is an opportunity for some legal construction, such as the national or local promulgation of some guidance or protection regulations for art collections, or the implementation of a major inspection or new revision of the Cultural Preservation Law, a comprehensive system pressure will be formed. This is not only about making up for the situation before it is too late, but also about being prepared for a rainy day, which can be said to be a great good.

References:

[1] Yu Qiuyu. Taoist Tower [A]. Yu Qiuyu. Cultural Journey [M]. Oriental Publishing Center. 2002.7.

Fan Meijun: Art theorist, art critic, member of the China Art Association, Chinese book Association member, professor at Jincheng College of Sichuan University. Main research directions: history and art theory of Chinese calligraphy and painting, as well as criticism and commentary on calligraphy and painting.

Source: "National Art Museum of China" Issue 3, 2019