Museum Development Witnesses Moderate Prosperity

COMPARED with large state-owned museums housing rich collections, changes in private museums and industrial museums can better reflect social changes. The remarkable increase in China’s manufacturing capacity and the great abundance of materials both verified Chinese people’s advances on the road to a well-off society.

- JIANG HAOFENG

From Antiques to Contemporary Works

Wu Shaohua, the founding chairman of the Shanghai Collectors Association, grew up in the older district of Shanghai City. Many people there love to collect old stuff.

The Shanghai Collection Appreciation Society, the predecessor of the Shanghai Collectors Association, was established in June 1986. Compared with its current scale of more than 6,000 members, Wu, now in his 70s, recalls back in the early days when there were only 20 people, and the collections they had were mostly old stuff. Private museums that gradually became well-known include: Wang Anjian’s Timepiece Museum, Chen Baoding’s Abacus Museum, Lan Xiang’s Chopsticks Museum, and Feng Yiyou’s Cigarette Museum.

Since the late Qing Dynasty (1636-1911), Shanghai has been well known for its large number of collectors. Many respected collectors there used to find treasures at state-run second-hand goods stores on Huaihai Road in the 1960s and 1970s.