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Lot Essay
The deer (lu) is linked with both official success and longevity. It is a play on the homonyms for "emolument" or "official salary," and linked with Luxing, the God of Rank and Emolument. Its association with longevity is attributed to the belief that it lived for a long time and that it was the only animal capable of searching out lingzhi, the fungus of immortality. The animal is often shown in the company of Shoulao, the God of Longevity, and Magu, a female immortal. According to ancient Chinese legend, the appearance of a white deer was highly auspicious, symbolizing a harmonious, peaceful kingdom.
Brilliantly carved in the form of a recumbent stag, this justifiably famous bottle is one of two known of identical subject and material and which are clearly by the same hand. The second bottle, formerly in the Gerry Mack Collection and now in the collection of Denis Low, is illustrated by R. Kleiner, Treasures from the Sanctum of Enlightened Respect, p. 211, no. 182, and which is also reproduced in Chinese Snuff Bottles No. 3, p. 23, fig. 13, and by E. B. Curtis, "Footnote to an Album," JICSBS, Spring 1985, p. 117, along with an illustration of the bottle from an early volume of life-sized watercolor paintings of a collection of snuff bottles, also in the J & J Collection (see lot 20). Although Curtis suggests that the album either represents the collection of Guy Mayer or George Fisher, subsequent research has linked the album conclusively to William Bragge, the author of Bibliotheca Nicotiana and one of the earliest serious collectors of snuff bottles in Europe (the album is lot 20 where it is discussed further).
Both transcendent masterpieces of the medium, the Low bottle and the J & J bottle are virtually identical, differing only in the angles of the heads, no doubt dictated by the need to use the suitably marked area of the material as the animal's eye. In both cases the exciting material is used to its utmost advantage to create both a distinctive snuff bottle and a superb small sculpture.
Brilliantly carved in the form of a recumbent stag, this justifiably famous bottle is one of two known of identical subject and material and which are clearly by the same hand. The second bottle, formerly in the Gerry Mack Collection and now in the collection of Denis Low, is illustrated by R. Kleiner, Treasures from the Sanctum of Enlightened Respect, p. 211, no. 182, and which is also reproduced in Chinese Snuff Bottles No. 3, p. 23, fig. 13, and by E. B. Curtis, "Footnote to an Album," JICSBS, Spring 1985, p. 117, along with an illustration of the bottle from an early volume of life-sized watercolor paintings of a collection of snuff bottles, also in the J & J Collection (see lot 20). Although Curtis suggests that the album either represents the collection of Guy Mayer or George Fisher, subsequent research has linked the album conclusively to William Bragge, the author of Bibliotheca Nicotiana and one of the earliest serious collectors of snuff bottles in Europe (the album is lot 20 where it is discussed further).
Both transcendent masterpieces of the medium, the Low bottle and the J & J bottle are virtually identical, differing only in the angles of the heads, no doubt dictated by the need to use the suitably marked area of the material as the animal's eye. In both cases the exciting material is used to its utmost advantage to create both a distinctive snuff bottle and a superb small sculpture.