Auction introduction: New Wave Beyond Yuanmingyuan presents the outstanding collection of an esteemed collector who has been at the forefront of the development of Chinese Contemporary Art for decades. Heightening the exposure and understanding of the Chinese avant-garde in China and abroad, the collector has followed the careers of vanguard Chinese artists, building up an outstanding collection of seminal works often considered radical or provocative at their time of creation. The collection features a curated selection of paintings, drawings, sculptures, performance works and photographs by pioneering artists who eschewed traditional models of representation in their desire to create something new. Many artists in the collection participated in the avant-garde movements of the 1980s and 1990s, a period of extraordinary creativity which reflected the transforming social, political and cultural landscape in China at the time. Indeed, the ‘85 Movement brought about a multitude of subsidiary, regional art movements that differed in style and philosophy across China. Amongst the works of the collection are some of the earliest and most significant known examples of abstract art, ‘Political Pop’, Cynical Realism, Neo-Realism, performance art and conceptual photography, as well as historically important works by founding members of avant-garde groups, including the Stars group (Xing Xing). Many of the works in the collection were acquired directly from the artist and as such have never been offered on the market before. Further, whilst a significant number of the works have rarely been seen by members of the public, some have been featured in pivotal exhibitions such as the second Stars Art Exhibition, Beijing in 1980; China/Avant-Garde Exhibition, Beijing in 1989; Paris-Pékin, at Espace Cardin, Paris in 2002; and ‘85 New Wave: The Birth of Chinese Contemporary Art at the UCCA Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing in 2007 - 2008, to name just a few.