A SUPERB EMBELLISHED AGATE BOTTLE

BOTTLE, OFFICIAL SCHOOL, 1760-1840; EMBELLISHMENT, JAPANESE, TSUDA FAMILY, CA. 1930

Details

A SUPERB EMBELLISHED AGATE BOTTLE
Bottle, Official School, 1760-1840; embellishment, Japanese, Tsuda Family, ca. 1930
The honey-toned agate bottle of rounded square shape and carved on the narrow sides with masks and fixed-ring handles, very finely decorated using different colors of soapstone, coral, lacquer and gilding with a lobed footed bowl with a lush arrangement of flowers, including chrysanthemums, lilies and camellia, set on a Japanese-style low table, the tray beneath with a gilt-metal figure of a bird set on an album and a ewer and a pouring vessel to the side, the reverse with a tapering cylindrical jardinière with pierced rockwork and red-berried branches set on a wood stand next to a shallow tripod jardinière filled with flowering lotus plants, a phoenix in flight above, stopper
2 9/16in. (6.4cm.) high

Lot Essay

Displaying a masterful use of materials and tasteful compositions, the present bottle must certainly rank among the finest bottles whose embellishment is attributed to the Tsuda family of Kyoto, Japan. For a discussion of the various theories surrounding the Tsuda family, and for an agate bottle with embellishment attributed to the family, see H. Moss, V. Graham and K. B. Tsang, The Art of the Chinese Snuff Bottle: The J & J Collection, New York, 1993, pp. 512-514, no. 302. Compare, also, other embellished bottles attributed to the Tsuda family, illustrated by R. Kleiner in Chinese Snuff Bottles in the Collection of Mary and George Bloch, London, 1995, p. 433-434, no. 285, and Treasures from the Sanctum of Enlightened Respect: Chinese Snuff Bottles from the Collection of Denis Low, Singapore, 1999, p. 228, no. 196.

See, also, two embellished bottles attributed to the Tsuda family, sold Sotheby's, New York, 19 September 2001, lot 247 and 248, and another bottle with comparable embellishment, lot 246.

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