A competitive bidding battle that raises the price of a common item at a public auction is undoubtedly a scene you've seen at least once in a movie or online series. Similar events recently took place on Saturday at the Osenat auction house in Fontainebleau, close to Paris, where a blue and white Tianqiuping vase was put up for bid and was sold for a total price of $9 million including fees.
The Chinese porcelain vase in the Tianqiuping style was sold for approximately 4,000 times its estimated value because buyers believed it to be an extremely rare relic, NDTV reported.
The vase's owner, who lives abroad, requested that the auctioneer sell it as part of the consignment of goods taken from their late grandmother's home in Brittany, northwest France, according to Jean-Pierre Osenat, president of the auction company, who spoke to CNN on Tuesday. "It's going to completely change their life," said Osenat. "It's hard for them to come to terms with."
CNN reported, "A total of 30 bidders, each of whom was required to make a deposit in order to participate, emerged from the 300–400 individuals who first expressed interest in placing a bid. Both in person and over the phone, there were 15 bidders total."
On the website of the auction company Osenat, it was described as a "porcelain and polychrome enamel vase in the style of the blue-white with globular body and long cylindrical neck, decorated with nine fierce dragons and clouds".
After seller fees, the transaction cost 91,21,000 euros ($90,77,356).
The bidders, most of whom were Chinese, were of the opinion that the vase was a priceless work of 18th-century art, according to The Guardian. The vase's shape gave rise to the name tianqiuping, which translates to "celestial sphere vase."