The exhibition “Restless Neva River” in Shanghai, which showcased modern oil paintings by Russian artists, suggests that Shanghai is gradually warming to Russian oil painting art.

The Value of Russian oil painting has been acknowledged

Russian oil painting is drawing more and more attention. Last year, Shanghai organized three exhibitions about Russian oil painting art, displaying contemporary oil paintings of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) and the Russia individually. And the museum of Minxing district has arranged exhibitions of Mylnikov and the works of the Repin Academy of Fine Arts. There are also a number of galleries specialized in Russian oil paintings in Shanghai.

At the auction market, Russian oil painting has the same story. In the middle of 1990s, the transaction rate was only 45 percent, and the auction price usually began at thousands of Yuan (RMB). Masters’ works were as low as 10,000 to 20,000 RMB. But the situation was reversed in 2004; the transaction rate rose 65 percent at auctions of Russian original oil paintings.

The work “Qi Baishi” by the artist MakcHMOBK.M of the USSR hit the knock-down price RMB 350,000, and another work of his “Da Chun—A Series of China” reached RMB 1320,000. In 2005, 13 Russian oil paintings were auctioned in Hanhai Auction Company, among which the Repin’s work “portrait” reached a knock-down price of 1760,000 RMB.