Page 8 - Christie's, Tang Collection of Important Chinese Ming Furniture May 31 to June 1, 2023 Hong Kong

The Cissy and Robert Tang
Collection of Chinese Classical Furniture

Prior to becoming a judge in 2004 and retiring from the Hong The elegant bookcases in the collection, lot 2708, have
Kong Court of Final Appeal in 2018, Justice Robert Tang was been widely admired and included in many exhibitions and
a barrister and then Queen’s Counsel in the 1980s and 1990s. publications. The first bookcase was purchased directly from
During those years, he regularly took breaks from his heavy Cola Ma. Later, Justice Tang had the opportunity, through his
workload in order to visit antique shops near his chambers in dealer Jim Lally, to purchase the other when it was offered as
Central, Hong Kong. He recalls that this was a daily activity, part of the Dr. SY Yip auction (which he had acquired from
and he often stopped to see the same dealer more than once Grace Wu) at Christie’s in 2002. As a reunited pair, these
a day, so quick was the turnover of items for sale during this bookcases are extremely rare.
period.
From amongst all his pieces of furniture, Justice Tang has
Robert Tang collected in several fields that were of particular selected his half-moon table as his favourite piece, lot 2709.
interest to him. He selected works based on his intellectual The rare form with a semi-circular top and pure fluid lines is
curiosity, rather than having a view to investment or resale. decorated only on the dragon-shaped spandrels that support the
During those two decades, he formed collections of Chinese cabriole legs. This table used to grace the entrance hall of his
archaic jades, early bronzes, Song ceramics, Buddhist sculpture, home.
modern paintings and classical furniture. He acquired his
furniture to live with on a daily basis. Justice Tang explains: A longtime member of the Min Chiu society, and its Chairman
‘As a collector, I have purchased pieces I found attractive, from 2007-2009, as well as a member of the Hong Kong
that appealed to me’ ... ‘I made decisions quickly, almost Palace Museum board, Justice Tang, along with his wife Cissy,
immediately, because, if I waited, there was a strong possibility has been in a position to discuss aspects of his collecting with
the piece would no longer be available the following day’. He likeminded collectors and international academics – often
notes: ‘I did not have a formal collecting philosophy. I bought making lifelong friendships.
what I could afford, every piece of furniture had to fit into
my home, or office, and had to have a function.’ He further As their children have now grown and live abroad, Robert and
explains: ‘… and when my home was full, in the early 2000s, Cissy Tang are planning to downsize, and to divide their time
I stopped’. The furniture was acquired from trusted dealers between their home in Hong Kong and overseas travels. They
and friends such as Robert Ellsworth, Cola Ma and Ho Chung offer this collection for sale in the hope that the pieces will
at a time when there was a steady flow of huanghuali furniture enter new homes, and help build new memories for others.
from China. There were several pieces he especially admired in Justice Tang explains: ‘I have never grown tired of the pieces in
Ellsworth’s Hong Kong flat at the New World Apartments, and my collection; each time I look at an object, I see what initially
while they were not available to purchase at the time, Ellsworth attracted me to it. However, the time has now come to pass on
later made good his promise to sell those pieces to Justice Tang some of these pieces to the next generation of collectors.’
when the former left Hong Kong 20 years later.

The pair of intricately carved huanghuali chairs, one with a qilin
carved to the backrest, the other with two mythical beasts, lot
2705, were purchased from Ellsworth who initially included
them in the exhibition Circa 1492: Art in the Age of Exploration
in 1991 in the National Gallery of Art, at which time they
were dated to the middle-Ming dynasty. Later scholarship
redated these chairs to 17th century. Interestingly, a further
pair of chairs from this series, each with a different animal
carved in openwork to the backrest, are now in a private Asian
collection. They were once in the collection of Gangolf Geis,
and were sold at Christie’s in New York in 2003. To illustrate
the fact that these chairs, and, indeed, all the furniture in the
Tang collection, were used by the entire family, Judge Tang
recounts how shocked curators from an American Museum
were when they visited his home and saw that he had mounted
a basketball hoop on the crest rail of one of the pair of chairs
for his young son.

A CONNOISSEUR’S STUDIO