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Lot Essay
As discussed by Wang Shixiang, Connoisseurship of Chinese Furniture: Ming and Early Qing Dynasties, vol. I, Hong Kong, 1990, p. 94, such chests would have been used to store long robes and dresses, hence the rectangular shape of the chest. See K. Ruitenbeek, Carpentry and Building in Late Imperial China: A Study of the Fifteenth-Century Carpenters' Manual in Lu Ban Jing, Leiden, 1993, for a reference to the book, Lu Ban Jing Jiang Jing (Lu Ban's Classic, A Mirror for Craftsmen), where two passages describe the deep clothes trunk (yilong) and the medium-sized clothes trunk (yixiang).
A very similar chest in the collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum is illustrated and discussed by C. Clunas, Chinese Furniture, London, 1988, p. 90, fig. 78.
Compare a massive camphor wood storage chest, illustrated without its wood stand, formerly property of the Asia Society and prior to that, from the Inger McCabe Elliot Collection, sold in these rooms, 21 September 2000, lot 12. See, also, another chest of similar proportions, the front of the stand carved with vigorously striding dragons, sold in these rooms, 21 September 2004, lot 7.
A very similar chest in the collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum is illustrated and discussed by C. Clunas, Chinese Furniture, London, 1988, p. 90, fig. 78.
Compare a massive camphor wood storage chest, illustrated without its wood stand, formerly property of the Asia Society and prior to that, from the Inger McCabe Elliot Collection, sold in these rooms, 21 September 2000, lot 12. See, also, another chest of similar proportions, the front of the stand carved with vigorously striding dragons, sold in these rooms, 21 September 2004, lot 7.