QIANLONG INCISED FOUR-CHARACTER MARK WITHIN A SQUARE AND OF THE PERIOD (1736-1795)

Among the very few Qianlong-marked boxes of this form and size, two examples in opaque coloured glass with gilt designs and belonging to sets of incense garniture are in the Qing Court Collection, illustrated by Zhang Rong, Luster of Autumn Water: Glass of Qing Imperial Workshop, Beijing, 2005, pls. 117-118; a smaller example (5.9 cm. diam.) in transparent purple, pl. 40; and another imitating realgar but without a mark, pl. 39. See also an example imitating realgar included in the exhibition Elegance and Radiance Grandeur in Qing Glass, the Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2000, pl. 134, where the author suggests the form may be fashioned after the peachbloom-glazed seal paste box of the Kangxi period.

See also a transparent red example with a yinyang roundel carved on the cover illustrated by C.F. Shangraw and C. Brown, A Chorus of Colors: Chinese Glass from Three American Collections, Asian Art Museum of San Francisco, 1995, no. 48, and later sold at Christie's Hong Kong, Luminous Colours: Treasures from The Shorenstein Collection, 1 December 2010, lot 2943.