Hi All
David Osborne just posted this info out to all on his Snuff Bottle Club membership list
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Here is the address of a web site that has been created by one of our Members, Marc Sontag,
http://www.exoticbirdphotography.com/Macro-Photography/Snuff-Bottles. Among the pictures, on the second page, you will see a lovely Dragonfly bottle by Suo Zhen Hai.
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The weblink url does not work properly but if you delete the last bit ... /Snuff-Bottles.... you can get onto the site
Or just google it
BTW: David Osborne still offers amazing VMIPBs - mostly by a limited number of artists, ( but Suo Zhenhai is among them, as is Pan Jiafang = Zhenyu ) at
ridiculously low auction reserve prices
His weekly auction system is unique : the winner at the close of bidding each week pays
the price bid by the second highest bidder plus US$0.50 .
To explain better - suppose there's a bottle on auction you really want : just bid US$1 million ! That automatically gets you No 1 and wins
If the other bidders are (in order )
No 2 US$ 300
No 3 US$ 280
No 4 US$ 150
etc
you only pay US$ 300.50 ( !!!!)
His email is
d.jill@shaw.ca If anyone wants to build up a good collection of VMIPBs painted in the 2000s, you cannot do better than join David's auctions, as well as check Bill Patrick's website for the bottles he currently has on direct* sale - fixed price <
www.snuffbottlecollector.com>
*sometimes Bill also offers bottles on e-bay, in which case - I assume - the auction / sale is subject to e-bay rules , whatever they are (I personally never buy on e-bay) . I cannot (
repeat : cannot and do not ) speak for Bill, but if there's a bottle on his website that is not listed for sale but which you really like, you can at least approach Bill directly and ask if he would be willing to sell it, and if so at what price.
He may or may not agree. But at the very least, he could probably arrange for a re-paint of that bottle because many of the artists whose works he has collected are either students of Li Shouxun or else are close friends of Li Shouxun , and so it's
maybe possible to liaise directly with the artists via Bill .
At an early stage of my collecting I corresponded almost daily with Bill and he taught me all I know, besides introducing me to many of the top artists in Hensghui. Once Bill knew that I love (only) Chinese landscapes he offered me several of his best Chinese landscape bottles at very fair prices, which I bought.
I hope that these snippets of info are useful for new collectors.
Cheers
Peter