Page 28 - March 17, 2020 Imperial Jade and Cloisonne, Sotheby's, New York

○ 13 A SPINACH-GREEN JADE With varying levels of relief expertly carved and finished to
CIRCULAR TABLE SCREEN
a lustrous gloss, the present screen is a superb example of
Imperial Palace during the 18th century. The skill of the carver is
QING DYNASTY, QIANLONG PERIOD jade workmanship characteristic of the type created in the
evident in the impeccably detailed figures and the vast ethereal
finely carved to one side in varying depths of relief with a landscape.
paradisiacal mountain landscape, the craggy bluffs divided by a
river zig-zagging through the composition and pooling in pond The Qianlong Emperor advocated that jade mountains and
below, one overhanging cliff with two elderly scholars conversing carved panels should carry the spirit of paintings by famous past
masters. It is recorded that a number of classical paintings from
near a walled garden, pagoda, and a studio with books visible the Emperor’s own collection were ordered to be reproduced in
through the moon window, a lower cliff with a third aged scholar
studying a scroll painted with the yin-yang symbol held open jade, such as the well-known painting Travelers in the Mountains,
by two attendants, a crane strutting nearby, all surrounded by by the eminent Five Dynasties painter Guan Tong (907-60). The
Gengzhi tu, a set of forty-six paintings illustrating rice and silk
gnarled pines, lofty wutong trees, and other lush vegetation culture commissioned by the Kangxi Emperor in 1696, was also
interspersed with swirling clouds, the reverse carved in low relief
with a flowering prunus branch growing from rockwork, a pair of recreated and is seen carved on a pair of screens in the Seattle
insects flying nearby, the stone of even deep green hue Art Museum, Seattle, illustrated in James C. Y. Watt, Chinese
Jades from the Collection of the Seattle Art Museum, Seattle,
1989, pl. 76.
Diameter 9⅜ in., 24 cm
Related screens carved from spinach-green and white jade,
PROVENANCE as well as apple-green jadeite, are known. Compare a smaller
jadeite screen from the Heber R. Bishop Collection carved with
Collection of Robert B. Woodward (1840-1915). a similar landscape, now preserved in the Metropolitan Museum
Gifted to the Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, in 1914 (acc. no. of Art, New York (accession no. 02.18.518); and a spinach-green
14.321).
jade screen sold in our Hong Kong rooms, 8th October 2014,
lot 3684. See also a screen with the reverse decorated with
LITERATURE
prunus and rockwork, sold in our London rooms, 21st October
John Getz, The Woodward Collection of Jades and Other Hard 1974, lot 58. Another with a gilt-bronze and cloisonné stand was
Stones, New York, 1913, pl. 98.
exhibited in The Arts of the Ch’ing Dynasty, Oriental Ceramic
Society, The Arts Council Gallery, London, 1964, cat. no. 410.
$ 60,000-80,000
See also a pair, with deer traversing a similar landscape, included
in the exhibition Three Dynasties of Jade, Indianapolis Museum of
Art, Indianapolis, 1971, cat. no. 35.
清乾隆 碧玉雕溪山觀太極圖圓插屏

來源
Robert B. Woodward (1840-1915) 收藏
1914年贈予布魯克林博物館，布魯克林 (館藏編號14.321)
出版
John Getz，《The Woodward Collection of Jades and Other Hard
Stones》，紐約，1913年，圖版98

The present lot illustrated in John Getz, The Woodward
Collection of Jades and Other Hard Stones, New York, 1913.
本拍品著錄於 John Getz，《The Woodward Collection of Jades
and Other Hard Stones》，紐約，1913年

52 PROPERTY FROM THE BROOKLYN MUSEUM, SOLD TO SUPPORT MUSEUM COLLECTIONS 53