Page 257 - Sotheby's October 3 2017 Chinese Art
P. 257

In the diary of a Jesuit priest, Father Gerbillon,    auction in New York, and by 1930 the enthusiasm       of Art, dated to the Kangxi period (1662-1722),
it is recorded that the Kangxi Emperor visited        had waned. Their interest to the present market       and not twelfth century, see M.S. Dimand and
Ningxia in 1697, and was presented with several       is the understated elegance and balanced              Jean Mailey, Oriental Rugs in the Metropolitan
locally made carpets which he took back with          composition of the early Chinese carpets, with        Museum of Art, with a catalogue of Rugs of China
him to the Empress. With Imperial interest in         their reduced and subtle range of colours.            and Chinese Turkestan, New York, 1973, fig. 299.
the Ningxia carpets and their designs being                                                                 Another example, of this design with similar
closely related to court styles of the Ming period,   For comprehensive discussion and technical            border type to the present carpet, and the use
their appeal continued throughout the 18th            analysis of Chinese carpets, and comparable           of pink, uses the traditional design and colour
century. Ancestor portraits of the 18th century       examples with geometric designs with central          palette, but is dated to the second half of the
are significant in contributing dates to styles of    medallions and shaped spandrels, seventeenth          nineteenth century (due to large size, weight and
carpets. In these portraits the carpets geometric     century, see Hans König and Michael Franses,          dense and high pile), and possibly a replacement
T- design and ‘swastika’ (wan) borders, and           exhibition catalogue, Glanz der Himmelssöhne:         for an earlier carpet used in the imperial district,
corner spandrels are often visible at the edges of    Kaiserliche Teppiche aus China 1400-1750              see Spuhler, Friedrich, The Thyssen-Bornemisza
the thrones in the pictures, see for example an       [Splendours of Sons of Heaven: Classical Chinese      Collection: Carpets and Textiles, London, 1988,
Ancestor portrait of a military officer of the first  Carpets 1400-1750], Museum für Ostasiatische          Chinese Carpets, no. 64, pp. 232-235. Evidence
rank and his wife, in the Royal Ontario Museum,       Kunst, Cologne, 2005-2006, London, 2005, cat.         that the appealing traditional design was
Toronto (inv. no. 921.1.154). For an interesting      nos 42-43, pp. 126-129, 203. This was the first       interpreted over time.
depiction of a textile cloak around the shoulders     exhibition of Chinese carpets in Europe since the
of male ancestor, which has a repeat design of        opening of the Musée Cernuschi, Paris, in 1911.       For comparable geometric designed pieces at
octagonal motifs and a scrolling border, see an       For a Ningxia rug, first half eighteenth century      auction see: a Ningxia carpet, early eighteenth
Ancestor portrait, ink and colour on silk hanging     (211 by 124 cm), with vertical composition of         century (310 by 203 cm), in our New York
scroll, Qing Dynasty, Royal Ontario Museum,           eight shaped cartouches (probably trays) with         rooms, 12th December 1997, lot 97, from the
Toronto, Canada (inv. no. 920.20249). This is         various objects, not dissimilar to those depicted     estate of Jennella Tyler Evans; a Ningxia carpet,
reminiscent of the carpets that have overall          on the present carpet, see Moshe Tabibnia and         eighteenth century (406 by 361 cm), in our New
repeat designs, and reveals the influence of the      Tiziana Marchesi, ed., Intrecci Cinesi, Antica Arte   York rooms, 22nd September 1993, lot 218,
woven silk textiles, both above cited portraits are   tessile XV-XIX secolo, Moshe Tabibnia Gallery,        from the collection of P.K. Kalaydjian; a Ningxia
illustrated and the early carpets comprehensively     Milan, 2011, cat. no. 25, pp. 152-153, and technical  carpet, eighteenth century (275 by 148 cm), in
discussed in Michael Franses, ‘Early Ningxia          analysis p. 257.                                      our London rooms, 12th April 1989, lot 397; and
Carpets in the Victoria and Albert Museum’, Hali,                                                           a Ningxia carpet, late eighteenth century (411 by
vol. 5. no. 2. 1982, pp. 132-140, figs 1 and 4.       For an interesting comparable design of carpet,       360 cm), in our New York rooms, 30th May 1987,
                                                      see the catalogue of a selling Exhibition, 16th-19th  lot 113, from the estate of Scofield Thayer.
The early Chinese rugs production of wool pile        Century, Oriental Carpets & Rugs, Jekyll’s Ltd, 74
carpets and rugs spanned over a century and           South Audley Street, 12th June to 31st August         Michael Franses and Robert Pinner, ‘The Chinese
they do not appear to have been exported to           1928, exhibit no. 154, catalogued as a Chinese        Carpet Collection – in the Victoria and Albert
Europe in the first quarter of the eighteenth         ‘Primitive’ Carpet (12ft by 6ft. 5in), Ming, middle   Museum’, Hali, vol. 5. no. 2. 1982, pp. 141-148,
century which was the height of the Chinoiserie       12th century (Price £285), illustrated front          fig. 6, illustrates an example of a Chinese carpet,
fashion. It was not until the Boxer rebellion that    cover. It has a similar ‘archaic’ design and the      (256 by 178 cm), post 1800 (inv. no. T.100-1909),
Chinese carpets appeared in any significant           same border types, the main field with additional     which depicts a combination of the medallion
numbers outside China. It was at the beginning        canted geometric angles creating the corners          motifs, a variation of corner spandrel design,
of the twentieth century that the West became         of a square around the central medallion, and         the double T-border and swastika border, along
aware of Chinese carpets, largely through the         further motifs of flaming pearls and stylised         with some of the objects which appear in the
dealers at the time which included Larkin and         ‘leaf’ dragons (dragon-snake). The considered         ‘meditation’ (hundred antiques design) carpets,
Kemp in London, and Yamanaka, Tiffany, Dilley         probably earliest design model for a similar,         an example of each separate design type being
and others in New York. Between 1909 and 1920         square format, of the leaf dragon design is noted     offered in this sale (see also lot 3648).
about 1,650 ‘antique’ Chinese rugs were sold at       against an example in the Metropolitan Museum

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