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拍品專文
The powerful dragon on the current box is depicted pursuing the flaming pearl amongst dense and complex clouds. The clouds themselves are auspicious symbols, in part because they provide a rebus for good fortune. It is also significant that clouds, such as the examples on this box, are often shaped like lingzhi fungus of immortality, and so emphasise a wish for long life. Particularly in an imperial context, the clouds also recall the shape of the head of a ruyi sceptre, suggesting the hope for ‘everything as you wish it’.
Very few Yongle-Xuande laquer boxes of this single dragon design are known, five of which are preserved today in museums, with a size varying from 17 cm to 23.5 cm : one in the National Palace Museum of Taipei (gu-qi-000373-N000000000) ; two in the Palace Museum of Beijing, illustrated in The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum, vol. 45 : Lacquer Wares of the Yuan and Ming Dynasties, Hong Kong, 2002, cat. 47 and 56, pp. 68-69 and 79 ; one in the Lindenmuseum, Stuttgart, published in Klaus J. Brandt, Chinesische Lackarbeiten, Stuttgart, 1988, pl. 32, from the collection of Fritz Low-Beer and one in the Tokyo National Museum, Tokyo, published in Oriental Lacquer Arts : special exhibition, Tokyo, Tokyo Kokuritsu Habutsukan, 1977, cat. 514. See a slightly larger dragon box (23.5 cm diameter), bearing a Yongle mark, sold in Sotheby's, Hong Kong, 4 April 2012, lot 3200. Another Yongle 'dragon' box, from the Emil Hultmark collection, was sold in Sotheby's, Hong Kong, 28 November 2018, lot 2.
Very few Yongle-Xuande laquer boxes of this single dragon design are known, five of which are preserved today in museums, with a size varying from 17 cm to 23.5 cm : one in the National Palace Museum of Taipei (gu-qi-000373-N000000000) ; two in the Palace Museum of Beijing, illustrated in The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum, vol. 45 : Lacquer Wares of the Yuan and Ming Dynasties, Hong Kong, 2002, cat. 47 and 56, pp. 68-69 and 79 ; one in the Lindenmuseum, Stuttgart, published in Klaus J. Brandt, Chinesische Lackarbeiten, Stuttgart, 1988, pl. 32, from the collection of Fritz Low-Beer and one in the Tokyo National Museum, Tokyo, published in Oriental Lacquer Arts : special exhibition, Tokyo, Tokyo Kokuritsu Habutsukan, 1977, cat. 514. See a slightly larger dragon box (23.5 cm diameter), bearing a Yongle mark, sold in Sotheby's, Hong Kong, 4 April 2012, lot 3200. Another Yongle 'dragon' box, from the Emil Hultmark collection, was sold in Sotheby's, Hong Kong, 28 November 2018, lot 2.