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WHEN ASSOCIATING CHINA WITH A GEM-STONE OR MINERAL, MOST PEOPLE THINK OF JADE. China’s culture of jade use and con-

noisseurship spans more than seven millennia. My first memorable exposure to jade was at a small shop in Flush-ing, New York, the city’s second “Chinatown.” The carv-ings and gemstones were beautiful and interesting, but

MINERAL TREASURES OF THE WORLD EXHIBITION

Beijing, C

hina

John RakoVanDepartment of GeologyMiami universityoxford, ohio 45056rakovajf@muohio.edu

what really grabbed my attention were their price tags. I thought that there must have been some mistake. What appeared to me to be very subtle differences in the ob-jects made huge differences in price, and the value of some stones was immense. The Chinese appreciation and value of jade objects is similar in its breadth and subtleties to that found among collectors of minerals in the West, yet

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On 18 May 2010 the first-ever Western exhibition in China of fine mineral specimens débuted at the Geological Museum of China in Beijing. The exhibition, created by Collector’s Edge

Minerals, Inc., of Golden, Colorado, and the Geological Museum, ran through 18 July.

the hobby of mineral specimen collecting is uncommon in China.

Most mineral collectors are well aware that China is one of the world’s great mineral specimen–producing countries, and that huge quantities of specimens have reached the market in the last twenty-five years (see further reading sec-tion at end of article). However, Western ideas of aesthetics

and the desirable characteristics in mineral specimens are not widely understood in China. Successful mineral deal-ers have learned these ideas, but few Chinese collectors have cultivated an advanced sense of mineral specimen apprecia-tion. Recognizing this, the Geological Museum of China ap-proached Collector’s Edge Minerals, Inc., of Golden, Colo-rado, with the suggestion to stage a mineral exhibition that

Dr. John Rakovan, an executive editor of Rocks & Minerals, is a professor of mineralogy and geochemistry at Miami Univer-sity in Oxford, Ohio.

GeoloGical MuseuM of chinaXisi, Yangrou hutong #15, Beijing

Webpage (in chinese): http://www.gmc.org.cn/

Telephone: 86 010 66557858

open: 9:00–4:30 (Tuesday–sunday)

admission: 30 chinese Yuan

Figure 1 (left). Geological Museum of china, Beijing. The red and yellow ban-ners announce the Min-eral Treasures of the World Exhibition.

Figure 2 (right). Dignitar-ies on stage in front of the Geological Museum of china for the opening ceremony of the Mineral Treasures of the World Exhibition, 18 May 2010. from left: Wenlin Ji, Jiahua shou, Bryan lees, shaoshi Xu, lichen Bai, Jiadi Xiao (andrew shaw), Zhu Xun, Xianlai Meng, and Yueming Jia.

would share the concepts of mineral aesthetics and Western sensibilities in advanced mineral collecting with the Chinese public. The museum also wanted the exhibition to address the economic value of minerals, as well as to promote the responsible development of mineral resources and their ef-fective use. Bryan Lees and the rest of the Collector’s Edge staff saw great potential in this idea to expand the world-wide market for quality mineral specimens into China and to foster the avocation and academic study of minerals and mineral collecting.

The result was the Mineral Treasures of the World Exhibi-tion, which was held at the Geological Museum of China in Beijing earlier this year. This was the first Western-style exhi-bition of mineral specimens ever held in China. A book pic-

turing most of the specimens on dis-play and including the full textual con-tent of the exhibition will be available through the Collector’s Edge website. The exhibit included more than one hundred exceptional specimens from many of the world’s great classic and contemporary occurrences. Although minerals from China are not specifi-cally highlighted, excellent examples were on display including rhodochro-site, pyromorphite, scheelite, stibnite, cassiterite, and fluorite from well-known localities. Specimens were cho-sen for their beauty and for exemplify-ing the major themes of the exhibition. These themes focused on the criteria for evaluating mineral specimen qual-ity; current market trends in mineral collecting; how mineral specimens are mined, collected, preserved, and pre-pared for display; as well as criteria for building a collection.

A remarkable aspect of the exhibi-tion was the short time span in which it was conceived, developed, transported, and staged. This was especially true given the hurdles created by language and cultural differences, customs, insurance, and the fact that the two teams collaborating on the project

Figure 3. some of the Geological Museum of china and collector’s edge (ce), members who organized the exhibition. from left: Zhunan Geng, Zhongpeng Jia, Graham sutton (ce), Yueming Jia, Bryan lees (ce), steve Behling (ce), Xiping cao, and Min Zhang (ce).

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Figure 4 (left). ccTV covering the opening of the Mineral Trea-sures of the World Exhibition.

Figure 5 (above). Rhodochrosite, fluorite, and tetrahedrite, Millennium Pocket, sweet home mine, alma, Park county, colorado, usa. specimen measures 18.5 × 16 × 6 cm. collector’s edge specimen, Jeff scovil photo.

were located on opposite sides of the globe. The majority of the work was compressed into a few short months (essen-tially from the end of the 2010 Tucson Show in mid-Febru-ary until the mid-May opening), and team members labored full time to reach the exhibition deadline. The entire textual content of the exhibit and book is in both Chinese and Eng-lish. In only two weeks these were written in English by Steve

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Beijing is the capital of the Peoples Republic of China. As the political, educational, and cul-tural center of the country, the city is rich in

historical sites and important cultural and govern-ment institutions: for example, the Forbidden City (the Chinese imperial palace during the Ming and Qing dynasties until the formation of a republic in 1911), Tiananmen Square, and the Summer Palace. With a population exceeding 17 million, Beijing is a metrop-olis of huge scale. Although plenty of skyscrapers ex-ist, Beijing is spread out laterally more than vertically. For the most part the city is flat, sitting in a basin and

surrounded on three sides by mountains. It is across these mountains that the eastern portion of the Great Wall of China lays, and numerous sections are within easy striking distance of the city center. Much to my surprise, I ran into the Miami University Glee Club while hiking along the Great Wall at Badaling.

Beijing has grown in recent years to become a bus-tling international city with expatriates and visitors from all corners of the globe. Travel within the city is easy, and most public signs are in Chinese as well as English. Street traffic, however, can be slow with no-torious traffic jams. The city has a vibrant atmosphere with sights, sounds, and tastes for just about every in-terest and palate.

As for mineral matters in Beijing, collections can be seen at the Geological Museum of China and the China University of Geosciences Museum. Both also have excellent geology and paleontology displays (with most text in Chinese only). At present there are about a dozen mineral dealers scattered around the Beijing area. Those that have a presence on the In-ternet have Chinese-language-only sites. The Miner-alogy Society of Hong Kong keeps a webpage with contact information for Beijing dealers at http:// minsochk.org/mineral_shop/Beijing.html. One min-eral dealer who is a good source of local information is Safaa Yu of Nanchang Mintang Gem Co., Ltd.; cell: 0086-13683372169; e-mail: safaa0202@hotmail.com; webpage: http://safaa0202.photo.163.com. ❑

author John Rakovan and wife Monica on the Great Wall at Badaling.

Beijing

Figure 6 (left). scheelite, Mt. Xuebaoding, sichuan Province, china. specimen measures 12 × 8.5 × 6.5 cm. collector’s edge specimen, Richard Jackson photo.

Figure 7 (right). Gold, farn-comb hill, Breckenridge district, summit county, colo-rado, usa. specimen measures 7.7 × 4 × 2 cm. collector’s edge specimen, Jeff scovil photo.

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Behling and photographs were taken by Richard Jackson, both of whom are employed by Collector’s Edge. One of the more tricky aspects of the exhibition development was translating this text into Chinese, which took another three weeks. Many of the concepts, such as provenance, involve subtle nuances, and Graham Sutton of the Collector’s Edge spent a week discussing individual concepts with the mu-seum team in order to find the best equivalent wording in Chinese. While the Collector’s Edge group was working on specimen preparation and exhibit text, a museum team of twenty-six people was working on preparations in Beijing. Exhibit cases and wall boards were all constructed in China and were delivered to the museum only days before the opening. Fortunately, all went smoothly at customs, and in the end everything was in place for the exhibition opening.

The opening ceremony was held on Tuesday, 18 May. It began with an outdoor ribbon cutting where Bryan Lees (president of Collector’s Edge Minerals), Yueming Jia (direc-tor of the Geological Museum of China), and others gave speeches about the purpose and expected outcomes of the exhibit. Lees also presented the museum with a fine rhodo-chrosite specimen from the Sweet Home mine in Colorado. Other dignitaries who attended the opening were Lichen Bai (vice-chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference [CPPCC]), Wen-lin Ji (director of the administrative office of the Ministry of Land and Resources of the People’s Republic of China), Shaoshi Xu (Minister of Land and Resources of the People’s Republic of China), Jiahua Shou (former vice-minister of Land and Resources of the People’s Republic of China and

Figure 8 (top left). apatite, nuristan, laghman Province, afghanistan. specimen measures 18 × 12.5 × 9 cm. specimen on loan to the collector’s edge, Richard Jackson photo.

Figure 9 (left). Topaz and quartz, sagaing district, Mandalay Division, Myanmar. specimen measures 15.5 × 12.5 × 10 cm. collector’s edge specimen, Richard Jackson photo.

Figure 10 (above). elbaite, quartz, and albite, Tourmaline Queen mine, Pala district, san Diego county, california, usa. specimen measures 21 × 18 × 15 cm. houston Museum of natural science specimen, Richard Jackson photo.

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president of the View Stone Association of China), Jiadi Xiao (who also goes by Andrew Shaw; First Secretary of the Em-bassy of the United States), Zhu Xun (former Minister of Geology and Mineral Resources of the People’s Republic of China and former secretary-general of the National Com-mittee of CPPCC), and Xianlai Meng (former director of the China Geological Survey and member of the National Committee of CPPCC). Their interest in the exhibition in-cluded broadening public knowledge of China’s mineral resources and value and helping to promote environmental awareness. Reporters from China Central Television (CCTV, the major state television broadcaster in mainland China) and the Xinhua News Agency (the official press agency of the government of the People’s Republic of China) covered the opening, and news of the event was broadcast over the entire country. Thousands of people visited the exhibition in its first weeks including individuals from the far reaches of China who had seen coverage of it in the national news and quickly flew to Beijing to view the display.

Several members of the foreign press were present for the opening ceremony including Kristina Bode of Mineralien-Welt magazine (Germany) and me for Rocks & Minerals magazine. Representatives from other Western journals vis-ited the exhibition later in the summer. Excitement about the exhibition was palpable, and it was apparent that this was many visitors’ first experience with exceptionally fine min-eral specimens. One longtime collector from the Chinese

military commented that he had no idea that such things existed and that his goals for specimen acquisition had just jumped to a completely new level. It was thrilling to be part of this event and to see the convergence of numerous inter-ests (commercial, scientific, educational, environmental, and cultural) focus on our hobby of mineral collecting.

acknoWleDGMenTsI thank Bryan Lees and the Collector’s Edge (http://www.collectors

edge.com) for underwriting my costs to attend the exhibition open-ing, making this article possible. I am grateful to Richard Jackson and Jeff Scovil for the use of their photographs, and to Bryan Lees, Steve Behling, and Graham Sutton for reviewing this manuscript. Finally, I also thank the staff of the Geological Museum of China for their hospitality during my visit to the exhibition.

fuRTheR ReaDinGExtraLapis. 2004. China special issue. ExtraLapis 26/27:1–198.Guo, K., and Z. Zhou. 1996. Mineral treasures (Chinese minerals).

Beijing, China: Geological Publishing House. Liu, G. 2006. Fine minerals of China (A guide to Chinese minerals

and localities). Zurich Switzerland: AAA Minerals AG. Mineralogical Record. 2005. China special issue. Mineralogical Re-

cord 36 (1): 1–136.———. 2007. China II special issue. Mineralogical Record 38 (1):

1–88.Ottens, B. 2008. China: Mineralien–Fundstellen–Lagerstätten. Mu-

nich Germany: Christian Weise Verlag.Rocks & Minerals. 2005. Minerals of China special issue. Rocks &

Minerals 80 (1): 1–80. ❑

Figure 11. adamite, ojuela mine, Mapimi, Durango, Mexico. specimen measures 10 × 6 × 4.5 cm. collector’s edge specimen, Richard Jackson photo.