China Business Uncovered Podcast: How a Lost Masterpiece Sparked a Museum Scandal

Spring in Jiangnan, a classical Chinese handscroll donated to the Nanjing Museum in 1959 by one of China’s most prominent collector families, suddenly showed up in an auction lot with an estimated value of 88 million yuan ($12.9 million), triggering public outcry over the mismanagement of treasured artifacts.

In this episode of China Business Uncovered, host Kelsey Cheng speaks with Caixin investigative reporter Xiao Hui and Wang Qiusheng, founder of the Society for the Ancient Chinese Art to trace the handscroll’s complicated journey: how it went from a prized donation to a work deemed fake, removed from the museum’s collection and then sold into private hands before reappearing on the auction market last year.