AN UNUSUAL CARVED RED LACQUER PEAR-SHAPED VASE, HU

QIANLONG CAST SEAL MARK WITHIN A RECTANGLE AND OF THE PERIOD (1736-1795)

细节

AN UNUSUAL CARVED RED LACQUER PEAR-SHAPED VASE, HU
QIANLONG CAST SEAL MARK WITHIN A RECTANGLE AND OF THE PERIOD (1736-1795)
The two sides finely carved in relief with scenes of The Feast of the Immortals on Mount Kunlun, with Shoulao, Xiwangmu, the Queen Mother of the West, and some, if not all of the Eight Immortals represented, all amidst a richly detailed setting of terraced pavilions and the rolling waves of a lake, within scrolling borders formed by the bodies of pairs of sinuous dragons confronted on flaming pearls, and surrounded by a dense mille fleur ground, with a pair of gilt-copper elephant-head handles and gilt-copper mouth and foot rims, the nianhao cast in the metal base
12 3/8 in. (31.4 cm.) high

拍品专文

The style of decoration on this unusual vase is very similar to that on a pair of large garlic-head vases (19½ in.) sold in our Hong Kong rooms, 26-27 April 1998, lot 570. As with the present vase, they too are finely and deeply carved with scenes of immortals bordered by sinuous dragons and reserved against a dense foliate ground, and they also have Qianlong seal marks cast in the metal base.
See, also, the hu with bronze stag-head handles, similarly carved in exacting detail with a continuous scene depicting Xiwangmu and various figures in the 'Southern Imperial Garden' below two poems on the neck, illustrated in Kaikodo Journal, New York, Autumn 1999, no. 70. The metal base is engraved with a six-character inscription written in Manchu which dates the vase to the 'eighth year of the reign of Qianlong (1743)'. The Kaikodo entry notes that when the carving of lacquer was re-introduced during the early Qianlong period, it was done in the palace workshops.