A FOSSILIFEROUS LIMESTONE SNUFF BOTTLE

Details

A FOSSILIFEROUS LIMESTONE SNUFF BOTTLE
1750-1880

Of rounded flattened form with an oval concave foot, the brightly colored material of a rich reddish-brown tone, the unusually large, matching fossils contained in a brick-like matrix radiating from the center, stopper
2 3/8 in. (6.02 cm.) high

Provenance

Sotheby's New York, 1 July 1985, lot 229
Hugh M. Moss Ltd.

Literature

JICSBS, Summer 1991, p. 6
Moss et. al., The Art of the Chinese Snuff Bottle, The J&J Collection, vol. 1, no. 81

Exhibited

Christie's New York, 1993
Empress Place Museum, Singapore, 1994
Museum fur Kunsthandwerk, Frankfurt, 1996-1997
Percival David Foundation of Chinese Art, London, 1997
Naples Museum of Art, Florida, 2002
Portland Museum of Art, Oregon, 2002
National Museum of History, Taipei, 2002
International Asian Art Fair, Seventh Regiment Armory, New York, 2003
Poly Art Museum, Beijing, 2003

Lot Essay

The present lot is an unusually vividly colored example among fossiliferous limestone bottles. For three other bottles carved from a similar type of limestone, with a reddish-brown ground suffused with lighter circular markings, see B. C. Stevens, The Collector's Book of Snuff Bottles, New York, 1976, nos. 666 and 661; an example in the Princeton University Art Museum, illustrated by M. C. Hughes, The Blair Bequest, Baltimore, Maryland, 2002, p. 85, no. 80; and the example in The Victoria and Albert Museum, illustrated by H. White, Snuff Bottles from China, London, 1992, p. 115, no. 1.

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