A VERY RARE PALE CELADON JADE SQUARE BRUSHPOT

細節

A VERY RARE PALE CELADON JADE SQUARE BRUSHPOT
QIANLONG PERIOD (1736-1795)

Intricately carved on the four facets with differing scenes of figures in landscapes with pavilions set amidst mountains in the distance, the first depicting fishermen under a willow tree, hauling up their catch, the second scene with peasants carrying bundles of sticks up a winding mountain pass, the next with a boy riding a buffalo while flying his kite, and the last facet with a scholar reading in a pavilion and his assistants preparing tea on the banks of a river, the brushpot raised on four tab feet at the corners, the stone of a very pale celadon tone with a few russet inclusions
5 5/8 in. (14.3 cm.) high, stand

來源

T.B. Walker
Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, Minnesota

出版

Catalogue of the Walker Collection, 1945, no. 311
J. Hartman, Connoisseur, February 1963
Robert Kleiner, Chinese Jades from the Collection of Alan and Simone Hartman, Hong Kong, 1996, no. 115

展覽

Christie's New York, 13-26 March 2001
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, August 2003 - December 2004

拍品專文

Each scene on this brushpot represents one of the Four Noble Professions: scholar, farmer, fisherman and woodcutter. This concept originated around the time of the Han dynasty and constitutes what was considered to be the ideal hierarchical system for the lay man.

The form of this brushpot is very rare. An example in the Palace Museum in Beijing, used as a jardiniere, is illustrated in Ming Qing Shinei Chenshe, Beijing, 2004, pl. 39. For further similar examples, see the Qing dynasty white jade brushpot of this form with scenes of children playing, included in the exhibition, The Refined Taste of the Emperor: Special Exhibition of Archaic and Pictorial Jades of the Ch'ing Court, National Palace Museum, Taiwan, 1997, pl. 59; an example carved with the four seasons, sold at Sotheby's New York, 19 October 1988, lot 312; and another, made from spinach-green jade, illustrated by Stanley Charles Nott, The Flowery Kingdom, New York, 1947, pl. LXXII.