Eastern Promise: Asian Artists Rise
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Major auction houses Christie's International PLC and Sotheby's are reporting glimmers of an art market rebound, especially in Asia, where over the past two years both have recorded big sales of works by contemporary Asian artists.

China's old masters are surpassing auction house expectations, too. A scroll painting by 16-century artist Wu Bin sold for $22 million at a Christie's sale in December.

Auction houses attribute the commercial rise of some Asian artists to the global economic downturn, which has stymied sales in the U.S. and Europe, as well as to an expanding pool of local art collectors.

At Sotheby's autumn sale in October, around 47% of the buyers of contemporary Asian works came from mainland China, compared with just 10% the previous April -- an increase that Evelyn Lin, head of Asian contemporary art at the auction house, says reflects the growing enthusiasm of mainland buyers as well as the hesitancy of collectors elsewhere.

It's not all great news. Prices for most artists' works, even the top sellers, have declined significantly. 'It's still difficult for everyone,' Ms. Lin says, saying prices for less sought-after Asian works have dropped between 30% and 40%.

For example, prices for newer works by Zhang Xiaogang, one of China's top-selling painters, have declined. His most acclaimed works, which Ms. Lin says was produced between 1994 and 1998, continue to reach record levels.

Mr. Zhang's 'Bloodline: The Big Family No. 3' fetched nearly $6 million at a Sotheby's April auction in 2008.

Five Asian artists ranked among last year's top 10 money-makers world-wide, according to Artprice, a research provider based in Lyon, France, which collected data on auction sales between June 2008 and June 2009. In the same 12-month period a year earlier, six Asian artists appeared, up from three in the previous period -- and an indication of the growing clout of Chinese artists on the world's art scene, which has been dominated by iconoclast names such as Damien Hirst and Jeff Koons.

Local Asian collectors are still willing to spend on art, but are more likely to go for works by 'established artists' rather than upstarts, says Johnson Chang, owner of Hanart TZ Gallery in Hong Kong, which specializes in Chinese contemporary art.

All five Asian artists ranked last year by Artprice have won international acclaim. Takashi Murakami and Anish Kapoor, the two non-Chinese names, are now staples of the global art world. Mr. Kapoor has erected popular public works in Millennium Park, Chicago and in Rockefeller Center, while Mr. Murakami has also gained notice applying his talents to a line of Louis Vuitton luxury handbags.

In order from Nos. 6 through 10, the ranked artists are: Zeng Fanzhi and Mr. Zhang from China, Mr. Murakami from Japan, Mr. Kapoor from India, and Chen Yifei, also from China and the only deceased artist in the group.

At a November Christie's sale in Hong Kong, an untitled painting from Mr. Zeng's 'Hospital' series pulled in $2.5 million. Mr. Zeng became the highest selling Chinese artist in early 2008, when a painting from his 'Mask' series scored a record sale, at $9.7 million.

'What's going on in China is very similar to what happened in New York City post-World War II,' says Ingrid Dudek, a senior specialist in Asian contemporary art at Christie's in Hong Kong. Like Andy Warhol and Jackson Pollock -- artists whose works in some ways captured the post-war American experience -- Messrs. Zeng and Zhang have turned out works that people consider iconic of contemporary China.