Meiyintang Collection

Gilbert Zuellig specialized in early pottery, stoneware and ceramics, spanning five millennia from the Neolithic period to the Han, Tang and Song dynasties, while his brother Stephen collected the porcelains of the later Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties as well as archaic bronzes of the Shang, Zhou and Warring States period.

[6] As of 1994, following the publication of the scholarly collection catalogues written by the researcher Regina Krahl, the term “Meiyintang” gained international recognition among specialists of Chinese art.

In 2001, President Chirac of France acknowledged the Zuellig brothers for their role in promoting the cultural understanding between East and West by awarding them the rank of Chevaliers of the Ordre National de la Légion d’honneur.

In 2011 and 2012, a substantial portion of the Yuan, Ming and Qing pieces of the Meiyintang Collection was sold in a series of auctions by Sotheby's in Hong Kong, among them the famed Chenghua “chicken cup.”[2] Shortly thereafter, selected pieces of Gilbert Zuellig's collection were placed on permanent loan with the Museum Rietberg in Zurich.

[8] As Gilbert Zuellig and his family wished to preserve his collection as an ensemble and to make it accessible to the general public, the majority of the pieces were transferred to a foundation, the Meiyintang Stiftung.