Comments by "Peter Jacobsen" (@pjacobsen1000) on "Lost, ancient Chinese Bodhisattva statue found in French home" video.

This statue was bought fair and square in the early 1930s in Beijing from the Chinese art collector Huo MingZhi (霍明志 1879-1949) by the grandfather of the current owner. It was not stolen.
60
Had this statue been in China during the Cultural Revolution, it would almost certainly have been completely destroyed. Some commenters suggest this statue might have been stolen. But if it was taken out of the country in the late 1920s or early 1930s, it was most likely bought and paid for. This was the Republican era, but at the tail end of over a decade of warlords, regional strife, corruption and graft. Chiang Kai Shek (Jiang JieChi) took power in 1928, but corruption and instability continued for a long time. It would have been easy to buy the statue from a local dealer or a temple abbot in need of money, pay off some officials and ship it overseas. EDIT: This statue was bought fair and square in the early 1930s in Beijing from the famous Chinese art collector Huo MingZhi (霍明志 1879-1949) by the grandfather of the current owner. It was not stolen.
28
This statue was bought fair and square in the early 1930s in Beijing from the Chinese art collector Huo MingZhi (霍明志 1879-1949) by the grandfather of the current owner. It was not stolen.
15
@Steven-xf8mz That IS irrelevant! The statue is from the 12th century and thus, unlikely to have been from Beijing in the first place. When the Mongols invaded in 1213, they razed the city to the ground. Therefore, it is highly unlikely that any temple artifact from before that time would have remained in Beijing until the 20th century. Beijing is key to your thesis, because the 8-nation army only looted Beijing. The statue is more likely to have been from a more ancient city, perhaps Xi'An, or Hangzhou, or Kaifeng or some other city.
4
Bought! This statue was bought fair and square in the early 1930s in Beijing from the Chinese art collector Huo MingZhi (霍明志 1879-1949) by the grandfather of the current owner. It was not stolen. They have the receipts!
4
@Steven-xf8mz "8 nations invaded China not too long before 1920s". No, that happened long before, in 1900. The statue was documented to be in France since the early 1930s, at least 30 years later. That makes it unlikely that it is from the same event.
3
@Steven-xf8mz Ok, I found some more info on this statue: It was bought in the early 1930s in Beijing from the Chinese art collector Huo MingZhi (霍明志 1879-1949) by the grandfather of the current owner. Hopefully, this can put our discussion to rest. We were both wrong, but it was interesting to speculate on the origin. You can read more about Huo MingZhi on Baidu: "霍明志,生于1879年,字宗杰,浙江绍兴人,二十世纪初著名收藏家"
3
@Steven-xf8mz "is this connected to what said about "would have been destroyed?" No, it is not, because the foreign invasions were not the cause of the Cultural Revolution (1966-76). You know who caused that.
3
@Steven-xf8mz A little more info: The statue sold on auction yesterday (June 14) in Paris. Hammer price: € 2,589,400
2
@goojxue1971 A huge amount were destroyed. You go visit old villages in southern Anhui around Huangshan, the region known as Huizhou, many villages are well-preserved, but almost all the carvings of deities and old sages have their faces cut off. Many Buddha statues you see in temples nowadays are pretty new. Zhou Enlai did his best to preserve what he could, and yes, some was preserved. I remember China in the 1980s, before they started renovating old temples and building new ones, there wasn't that much to see.
2
@goojxue1971 I've only been to Taiyuan, many years ago. Maybe some day I will visit again.
2