Anonymous Collector has rejected 27 million U.S. dollars from Chinese billionaire Stanley Ho to buy Heavenly horse finial, because Collector lost two sisters in one month from coronavirus. Collector believes it could have been stopped at the source. It could have been stopped quickly and it wouldn’t have spread all over the world. China must be held accountable for coronavirus spread.
Stanley Ho is the gaming mogul and majority owner of the Macao casino. Ho is an avid collector of Chinese artefacts. Behind him lies a bronze horse-head sculpture he bought for a record $8.8m in 2007. The work — the most expensive Qing dynasty sculpture sold at auction — is one of the 12 heads of zodiac animals which graced a water-clock fountain in Yuanmingyuan, the imperial summer palace near Beijing, that was looted in the 19th century. When Ho bought the sculpture through Sotheby’s Hong Kong, the avid racehorse owner donated it to China. It is on temporary display in the Grand Lisboa while Ho decides which government department to give it to. A well-respected Hong Kong-based dealer notes that many of Ho’s acquisitions are made quietly, in private sales rather than public auctions.
