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Lot Essay
The choice of motifs on this box is in keeping with the Jiajing emperor's keen interest in Daoism and the attainment of immortality. The cranes symbolise immortality and this imagery is reinforced by the central Shou character.
Although no other box of this exact design appears to be published, compare the carving on the present example with a smaller Jiajing-marked polychrome lacquer box (26cm.) also depicting a large Shou character on the cover and dragons on the sides of the box, in the collection of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (no.M.80.152.2a-b).
A Jiajing circular polychrome box in the Palace Museum, Beijing with a different arrangement of cranes around a Shou character is illustrated in Lacquer Wares of the Yuan and Ming Dynasties, The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum, Commercial Press, Hong Kong, 2006, p. 179, no. 137.
Compare with a related but smaller polychrome lacquer box and cover, similarly carved with dragons, which was sold at Christie's Hong Kong, 1 June 2011, lot 2861.
Although no other box of this exact design appears to be published, compare the carving on the present example with a smaller Jiajing-marked polychrome lacquer box (26cm.) also depicting a large Shou character on the cover and dragons on the sides of the box, in the collection of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (no.M.80.152.2a-b).
A Jiajing circular polychrome box in the Palace Museum, Beijing with a different arrangement of cranes around a Shou character is illustrated in Lacquer Wares of the Yuan and Ming Dynasties, The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum, Commercial Press, Hong Kong, 2006, p. 179, no. 137.
Compare with a related but smaller polychrome lacquer box and cover, similarly carved with dragons, which was sold at Christie's Hong Kong, 1 June 2011, lot 2861.