Yue Minjun

Everything LLB Auction has offered under this name has come from Smile-ism, a set of lithographs published in 2006 in editions of forty five. Prices reported for the oil paintings, such as the USD 309,750 paid for Great Solidarity at Bonhams in 2006, say nothing about what a sheet from that edition is worth. Bron

The print market under this name has softened. An impression of Smile-ism No. 15 numbered 29 of 45 made HKD 36,250 at Bonhams in Hong Kong in May 2014, well above what comparable sheets have realised in Europe more recently. Bron

Sheets from this series do fail. An impression of Smile-ism No. 20, also numbered 29 of 45, was offered at Bonhams in Hong Kong in May 2013 against an estimate of HKD 30,000 to 50,000 and did not sell. Bron

The Smile-ism sheets are signed in Latin script at the lower right and numbered in pencil at the lower left, and the printer's credit reads Museum Collections Editions. A sheet without pencil numbering carrying the same laughing head is likely to be an exhibition poster rather than an edition impression. Bron

The same motif appears across oil paintings, bronzes, watercolours, lithographs and collaborative editions made with other artists. Identify which of those a work is before comparing it to any published price, because the bands do not overlap. Bron

These are large colour lithographs, commonly framed and hung. Fading, cockling and staining at the edge of an old mount are the recurring condition faults and are read hard by specialists in this material. Bron