旅美收藏家去世十年 遗产纷争未决

It has evolved into one of New York’s longest-running fights over an estate.

这宗遗产争夺案，已成为纽约持续时间最久的这类案件之一。

For more than a decade, the family of C. C. Wang, a collector whose name graces a gallery at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, has been battling over a trove of classical Chinese paintings and scrolls that has been described as among the finest in the world.

十多年来，王己千(C. C. Wang)的家人一直在争夺一批世界一流的中国古画和卷轴。王己千是一名收藏家，纽约大都会艺术博物馆(Metropolitan Museum of Art)以他的名字命名了一间陈列室。

Now, the feud has escalated. In the past month, two of Mr. Wang’s children, who have been fighting in Surrogate’s Court in Manhattan since his death in 2003 at 96, filed lawsuits in state and federal courts accusing each other of looting and deceit.

现在，宿怨进一步升级。王己千2003年过世，享年96岁，此后他的两名子女一直在曼哈顿的遗嘱检验法院(Surrogate’s Court)争夺遗产。过去一个月中，这两名子女分别在州级法院和联邦法院提起诉讼，指控对方存在劫掠和欺诈行为。

But beyond the family strife, a broader issue is dismaying Chinese-art experts for whom the Wang collection has long been a source of wonder.

但是，在家庭纷争之外，还有一个更大的问题令中国艺术领域的专家感到失望。一直以来，王己千藏品都是这些专家仰慕的对象。

Dozens, perhaps hundreds, of works from an estate once valued in court papers at more than $60 million have gone missing, including an 11th-century scroll, “The Procession of Taoist Immortals,” that is viewed in China as a national treasure.

法庭文件显示，王己千遗产的价值超过6000万美元（约合3.7亿元人民币）。然而，已有数十件，或许是数百件作品不知所踪，其中一幅11世纪的卷轴《朝元仙仗图》，在中国被视为国宝。

“This is heartbreaking, and it is happening right here in the city,” said Laura B. Whitman, a specialist in Chinese art formerly with Sotheby’s and Christie’s, who used to visit Mr. Wang at his apartment in New York to view his collection.

“这事令人心碎，它就发生在这座城里，”曾为苏富比(Sotheby’s)和佳士得(Christie’s)工作的中国艺术类专家劳拉·B·惠特曼(Laura B. Whitman)说。王己千在世的时候，她会到他在纽约的公寓拜访，观看他的藏品。

Divining who rightfully owns these works, and who is to blame for the disappearance of so many of them, has consumed the family for more than a decade.

谁理应拥有这批藏品？而这么多藏品失踪究竟又是谁的错？这些问题王家人已经争执了十多年。

The case has become so complex, and so expensive, that the Surrogate’s Court has suspended discussing matters of inheritance until it can come up with a reliable inventory of what was initially in the collection to see if the estate will be able to pay lawyers and other creditors.

这宗案子已经变得如此复杂，费用如此高昂，以至于遗嘱检验法院已暂停讨论继承问题，直到托管机构可以提供最初藏品的可靠清单，以便看看是否足够支付律师费和欠其他债权人的债务。

Among the few certainties at this point is that Mr. Wang demonstrated the ability to acquire objects of historical importance, objects that since his death have increased many times in value as the Chinese art market has boomed.

目前，可以确定的事情寥寥无几，其中之一是：王己千在收藏历史名作上很有眼力。自他过世后，随着中国艺术品市场的蓬勃发展，这些作品增值了很多倍。

Born near Suzhou, China, in 1907, he moved to the United States during China’s political upheavals in 1949, settling in Manhattan, where he built a career teaching, consulting at Sotheby’s, and dealing in real estate and in art. He became the dean of the rarefied market for Chinese art in New York and was an accomplished artist in his own right. By the end of the 1990s, the Met had bought some 60 works that were once part of his collection and named a gallery in his honor.

1907年，王己千在中国苏州附近出生。1949年，中国政局动荡期间，他移居美国，最终到曼哈顿定居，并在那里教学、为苏富比提供咨询服务，以及买卖房地产和艺术品。纽约的中国艺术市场当时规模较小，而他成为了这个市场的领军者，而他本人也是一位颇有建树的艺术家。20世纪90年代末，大都会博物馆从他的收藏中购买了大约60件作品，并以他名字为一间陈列室命名。

Among the Met acquisitions was a colossal hanging scroll titled “Riverbank,” attributed to the 10th-century painter Dong Yuan, but which attracted its own controversy after some scholars declared it a 20th-century forgery.

大都会从他那里购得的作品之一，是一幅巨大的山水立轴《溪岸图》，据称为10世纪的画家董源所作。不过，它后来引起了争议，被一些学者宣称是20世纪的伪作。

Maxwell K. Hearn, chairman of the Met’s Asian art department, said Mr. Wang acquired much of his important collection early on, when the market for Chinese art didn’t exist.

大都会亚洲艺术部主任何慕文(Maxwell K. Hearn)表示，王己千的大部分重要收藏都是他一早购入的，当时中国艺术品市场尚未成形。

“He saw their continued relevance as sources of artistic inspiration,” Mr. Hearn said. “Now, they have become enormously valuable, because people are recognizing their cultural significance and acknowledge him as a source of validation.”

“这些作品一直都很重要，而他把它们视为艺术灵感的来源，”何慕文说。“现在，它们的价值已经变得非常高，因为人们开始认识到它们的文化意义，并认为他的收藏是对作品的一种认可。”

Before his death, Mr. Wang left some works to his daughter Yien-Koo Wang King, now 79, and some to his son, Shou-Kung Wang, now 85, both of whom served during different periods as confidant and business agent to their father.

临终前，王己千把藏品中的一部分留给女儿王娴歌(Yien-Koo Wang King)，另一部分则留给儿子王守昆(Shou-Kung Wang)。王娴歌现年79岁，王守昆85岁，两人均曾在不同时间段与父亲关系亲密，并担任他的商业代理人。

But they have battled over the legacy, particularly the validity of a 2000 will that listed Mrs. King as executor and of a competing will, drawn up shortly before Mr. Wang’s death, that named Shou-Kung Wang’s son, Andrew, as executor, and disinherited Mrs. King.

但两人为遗产，特别是两份遗嘱的真伪起了纷争。其中一份立于2000年，指定王娴歌为遗嘱执行人；另一份则是在王己千过世前不久定立的，指定王守昆及其子王义强(Andrew Wang)为遗嘱执行人，并剥夺了王娴歌的继承权。

Amid the fighting, estimates differ widely about how many classical Chinese paintings were in Mr. Wang’s collection when he died, from about 240 to 438.

在这场纷争中，对于王己千身后留下的藏品中究竟有多少中国古画，各方估计的数目存在很大的出入，从240至438幅不等。

Together, since 2003, the son and daughter have surrendered more than 120 artworks to the estate for sale, but have also accused each other of hiding many more of the most valuable paintings in the United States, in China or elsewhere.

加起来，自2003年以来，双方一共交出了120多幅作品，供遗产托管机构出售。不过，他们还互相指责对方在美国、中国或其他地方藏匿了更多价值极高的画作，规模远超这一数字。

The Internal Revenue Service is seeking more than $20 million in estate taxes, based on its own inventory of paintings, real estate and other possessions at the time of death, though that fee is based on a valuation of some paintings that may well now be missing.

根据美国国税局(Internal Revenue Service)掌握的一份清单，它要征收逾2000万美元的遗产税。这张清单列出了王己千过世时的画作、房地产和其他类型的财产，不过这笔税涉及的一些画作现在很可能已经失踪。

The tax bill and claims for lawyers’ fees so outweigh the value of the handful of remaining classical works held by the estate in a warehouse in New Jersey that the Surrogate’s Court decided it was not worth proceeding until a proper accounting can be made.

遗产税和律师费，远远超出了遗产托管机构持有并存放在新泽西州一间仓库里的为数不多的剩余藏品的价值。因此，遗嘱检验法院决定该案不值得继续审理，除非所涉财产进行了恰当清点。

The latest legal actions are an effort to break the deadlock. In a filing in federal court in Manhattan last month, Mrs. King and her husband, Kenneth, said that her brother and his son had conspired to loot the estate through sham art sales and had lied about the whereabouts of works.

双方新近采取的法律行动，目的是打破这种僵局。王娴歌和她的丈夫肯尼斯(Kenneth)上月联名向驻曼哈顿的联邦法院提起诉讼，称王守昆及其子合谋伪造艺术品销售记录，从而劫掠遗产，并且谎报藏品下落。

Mrs. King said in her filing that Shou-Kung Wang’s son, Andrew Wang, 53, who shares fiduciary duty for the estate with the public administrator of Surrogate’s Court, made up bogus addresses of buyers, and even, in one case, shipped $1.4 million worth of the art to his home in Shanghai.

王娴歌在诉状中称，王守昆现年53岁的儿子王义强伪造买家地址，有一次甚至把价值140万美元的艺术品运到他在上海的家中。王义强和遗嘱检验法院的公共管理者共同对这笔遗产负有托管责任。

The lawsuit also accuses the Wangs of giving conflicting accounts of the location of one work, “Album of Landscapes” by the 13th-century painter Ma Yuan. A decade ago, Shou-Kung Wang told the court that his father had given him the painting and it was in his possession.

诉状中还指责王守昆和王义强对13世纪画家马远所作的《山水册》的下落说法不一。十年前，王守昆告诉法院，这幅画是父亲给他的，属于他的财产。

But lawyers for Mrs. King have produced a 2011 television interview in China in which a collector there says he bought the painting from C. C. Wang’s family after his death, for what the lawyers say was more than $5.5 million.

不过，王娴歌的律师拿出了2011年在中国播放的一段电视采访，其中显示，有藏家说，在王己千过世后，自己从王家人手中买到了这幅画。律师表示，这幅画的价格逾550万美元。

Asked recently in court about the discrepancy, Andrew Wang said that his grandfather had in fact sold the painting shortly before he died. He said Shou-Kung Wang had believed that he still owned the painting at the time of his testimony because Andrew and C. C. Wang had concealed the sale.

近期在庭上被问及此事时，王义强解释，实际上是祖父在过世之前不久出售了这幅画，但王守昆当年在作证的时候，认为自己仍然拥有这幅画，因为王义强和王己千没有把此画已经出售的事情告诉他。

A lawyer for Shou-Kung Wang and Andrew Wang, Carolyn Shields of Liu & Shields in Queens, denied Mrs. King’s allegations.

皇后区凯撒刘瑛律师楼(Liu & Shields)的卡罗琳·希尔兹(Carolyn Shields)是王守昆和王义强的律师团队成员，她否认了王娴歌的指控。

For their part, they argue in a lawsuit filed last week in State Supreme Court in Manhattan that it was the Kings who have diverted assets by hiding works in a warehouse in New York, transferring ownership of them to foreign corporations and selling them.

上周，王守昆父子这边也向位于曼哈顿的州级最高法院提起诉讼，声称王娴歌夫妇把作品藏匿在纽约一间仓库中，并把它们的所有权转移给外国企业或予以出售，通过这种方式转移了资产。

One of the few things the two sides agree on is that “The Procession of Taoist Immortals,” an ink-on-silk hand scroll that is one of the most important works in the collection, is missing.

双方没有异议的事情寥寥无几，其中一件是：最重要的藏品之一、绢本墨笔卷轴《朝元仙仗图》不知所踪。

Probably a sketch for a mural painting, it depicts a group of Taoist gods in intricate detail. Experts say it is an early and rare example from the Northern Song dynasty of a Taoist theme.

这幅图很可能是一幅壁画稿本，以繁复的细节描绘了一群道教神仙。专家表示，它是北宋早期的道教题材作品，颇为罕见。

“It is of monumental significance,” said Stephen Little, a curator of Chinese art at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

“它具有极为重大的意义，”洛杉矶城市艺术博物馆(Los Angeles County Museum of Art)的中国艺术类策展人斯蒂芬·利特尔(Stephen Little)说。

Attributed to Wu Zongyuan, it is valued by experts at tens of millions of dollars.

该画为武宗元所绘，专家估计它的价值数以千万美元计。

In 2005, both sides put “Procession” in a Shanghai bank’s safe-deposit box. The box was to be opened again only in the presence of both sides.

2005年，双方把《朝元仙仗图》放入上海一家银行的保险箱。这个箱子只能在双方均在场的情况下才能再次打开。

Hearing reports that “Procession” had been seen outside the bank, Mrs. King demanded that Andrew Wang open the box to inspect the painting with her, but, according to her complaint, he defied a Chinese court order and refused to attend.

听说有人在银行外面看到了《朝元仙仗图》后，王娴歌要求王义强和她一同前去打开保险箱进行核实。然而，根据她的说法，王义强对中国法院的判令置之不理，拒绝到场。

When the box was opened in 2009, the result was disappointing, she said. Instead of a treasure, the box contained a cheap, discolored print of the scroll. The theft was reported to the Shanghai police, who declined to investigate what they called a family matter, said a lawyer for the Kings, Sam P. Israel of Manhattan. Shou-Kung Wang and Andrew Wang said they were never told the box was going to be opened and suggest that Mrs. King somehow stole the scroll.

王娴歌说，2009年保险箱打开时，结果令人失望。珍贵的原作不见了，箱内只有一个褪了色的廉价卷轴印刷品。曼哈顿律师萨姆·P·伊斯雷尔(Sam P. Israel)称，她向上海警方报告了这起盗窃案，但警方说这是家务事，拒绝进行调查。王守昆和王义强则称，没有人告诉他们箱子将会被打开，暗示王娴歌以某种方式偷走了卷轴。

Five years later, its whereabouts remains unknown.

五年后的今天，它仍然下落不明。

“To think that something like that is out there and is not being seen and preserved and appreciated by humanity is just sad,” Ms. Whitman said.

“这样的画作流落在外，没人看，没人爱惜，没人欣赏，真是一想到就难过，”惠特曼说。