YONGZHENG PERIOD (1723-1735)

This magnificent screen, with its unusual decorative scheme combining painted lacquer decoration, hardwood inlay and painted glass panels is a rare example of the type of furniture made during the Yongzheng period. No other comparable examples seem to have survived, but from the records of the Zaobanchu, the Imperial Workshop of the Qing Dynasty, we learn that more than half of the screens that were commissioned in the Yongzheng period contain elements of glass inlay, inset or panels of some description. Large sheets of transparent glass at this time were considered luxury items, since they had to be imported from Europe, and were often sent as tribute from Canton. For example, in 1731 the customs officer Zu Binggui sent as tribute to Court such a sheet wrapped in white wool in a wooden box. Furniture pieces, especially screens and panels, inset with these glass sheets were very popular at Court. The current screen, due to its height, is likely to have been made for use on a kang bed. Records show that in the same year Zu Binggui also sent as tribute a pair of 'carved kang screens inlaid with painted glass panels' to Court, and the Yongzheng Emperor was clearly delighted with them, asking specifically for them to be taken into the collection of the Imperial household. However, fashion changed in the later part of the Qianlong period, probably due to the ready availability of sheet glass. The Qianlong Emperor asked for these glass insets to be removed from old furniture pieces and replaced with other materials, such as zitan panels, which explains why so few of these examples survived. Compare a large zitan screen which still has its painted glass panels intact, in the Palace Museum, Beijing, illustrated in Furniture of the Ming and Qing Dynasties (II), The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum, Hong Kong, 2002, p. 138, no. 203

The Yongzheng Emperor favoured painted lacquer furniture over hardwood furniture, considering lacquered pieces to be more durable than hardwood, and would sometimes even require hardwood to be lacquered in order to suit his taste. Many examples of lacquered furniture from the Yongzheng period survive in the collection of the Palace Museum in Beijing, such as the luohanchuang illustrated in ibid, p. 8-9, no.5, which has very similar gilt-on-black lacquered landscape scenes to those found on the current screen.