When it gets dark, the antiques market in the southern Chinese metropolis of Guangzhou comes alive. The stallholders spread a square cloth on the floor and put old furniture, old radios, Ming Dynasty or Qing Dynasty tableware, antiques, paintings, calligraphy, etc. for sale.
Wu Kaisi was born in 1995 and studied law at university. After graduating from university, he is not looking for a job in the law field like his fellow students. He is fascinated by old objects and has started collecting them to make a living. To date, he has collected tens of thousands of items.
The first ancient item Wu Kaisi collected was a clay wine bottle labeled “Guilin Old Town,” which he bought at a flea market during his trip to Guilin in 2014. In his opinion, taking this bottle home made more sense than buying a mass-produced tourist souvenir.
This journey opened the door to the world of old things for him. In every city he visited, he made sure to visit the local flea markets. During his senior year, he traveled to the United States for a month, browsing thrift stores in Chicago, New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco.
“It was the first time I found out that used goods were in such high demand. And you can even work as a collector of second-hand goods.” According to Wu Kaisi.
Upon his return from the US, Wu Kaisi went in search of antique markets in Guangzhou and spent two weeks on site exploring the twelve existing markets in Guangzhou and making a list of things to know. He became a regular customer at some markets.
Wu said he once received a large package of letters that chronicled a person’s life from early childhood to adulthood. “After I posted the content of the letters on the Internet, I did not expect that the owner of the letters would see them and tell me that they had been carelessly discarded by her relatives. She asked me if she could buy the letters back and I immediately gave them to her as a gift.”
Many would have asked him what the point of this profession was. To which Wu replied, “I want to preserve something someone has given up so that its value will be passed on forever. It can be displayed in my old stuff space or it can become something that someone else likes.”
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