Lot Essay
The needle-like crystalline inclusions can be black (tourmaline), green (actinolite) and coppery-red or silvery-gold (rutile). It is rare to find crystal playing host to two mineral inclusions and the bottle's markings form an extraordinary composition alluding to an abstraction of reeds growing at the edge of a lake in the depth of winter. This subject is often found in Chinese paintings and, like bamboo, was a subject which allowed great expressiveness with the lines providing an intriguing pattern.