700 year old scroll fetches £30m at auction
Hong Kong: A 700-yearold Chinese painted scroll from the Yuan Dynasty fetched 306.6 million Hong Kong dollars (£30.5 million) at a Sotheby’s auction in Hong Kong.
The 6.6-feet scroll, titled Five Drunken Princes Returning on Horseback, is by Ren Renfa, a renowned Chinese artist and government official.
The painting depicts the princes’ riding horses, with four attendants. One of the princes is Li Longji, who later became the long-reigning Emperor Xuanzong of the Tang Dynasty.
The scroll has been documented in imperial collections and bears a collection of seals, including those of several emperors.
In 1922, the Five Drunken Princes Returning on Horseback scroll was transported out of the Forbidden City by Pu Yi, the last emperor of China, after the fall of the Qing dynasty.
Many of Ren’s 21 paintings are held in museums or owned by private collectors.
Hollywood: Wonder Woman director Patty Jenkins has said that movie-going is facing a real threat of extinction.
Her new superhero movie has been delayed three times during the coronavirus pandemic.
She is among dozens of top Hollywood directors appealing to the US government to provide a financial lifeline to cinemas.
Ms Jenkins’s warning comes as cinemas in the UK are also struggling with a recent spate of delayed film releases.
“If we shut this down, this will not be a reversible process,” she said in an interview with Reuters news agency. “We could lose movie theatregoing forever.”
Madrid: The Spanish government has said it wants to change the law to allow 16 and 17-yearolds to seek an abortion without parental permission.
Equality Minister Irene Montero said women should have the right to “decide about their bodies”.
In 2015, the ruling Popular Party (PP) changed Spain’s abortion laws and mandated parental consent for those aged between 16 and 18.
Abortion is legal in Spain in the first 14 weeks of a woman’s pregnancy.
Ms Montero said the reform was “more than necessary”.
She added that other measures would be introduced, including a greater focus on sex education which she described as a “vaccine” in the fight against gender violence.
Baruwa: An explosion that ignited a fire at a petrol station in the Nigerian commercial capital, Lagos, has killed at least eight people, and has destroyed at least 25 homes, 16 shops and a primary school.
The explosion occurred in the early hours of yesterday in Baruwa, a largely residential area.
The cause of the blast is still unclear, but the emergency services say a gas emission had been identified and contained.
The explosion is the latest in a series in Nigeria. Two weeks ago about 30 people were killed when a lorry carrying fuel exploded in Lokoja in central Nigeria.
A day later dozens were injured in a similar incident in Lagos.
While the reasons for the explosions remain unclear, observers say it may be because of poorly maintained facilities and a lack of efficient means of transporting fuel to petrol stations.