Page 60 - Christies IMportant Chinese Art Sept 26 2020 NYC

PROPERTY FROM THE MARILYN ACKERMAN COLLECTION
1538
A RARE LARGE GOLD AND SILVER-INLAID BRONZE
TAPIR-FORM VESSEL, XIZUN
YUAN-MING DYNASTY (1279-1644)
The stocky, tapir-like mythical beast is heavily cast standing foursquare Even in the Song dynasty inlaid bronze copies appear to have been
with head facing forward, ears pricked and tail pointed downwards. made of these zoomorphic vessels, and their popularity continued
The body is inlaid in silver and gold with geometric scrolls and the head into the Yuan and Ming periods. A Yuan dynasty example with gold
is cast in relief with curved brows and a collar encircling the neck. The and silver inlay from the collection of the National Palace Museum,
hollowed body is fitted with a hinged cover cast and decorated as a bird Taipei, is illustrated in Through the Prism of the Past, Taipei, 2003, p.
with backward-turned head centering its curved wings. 186, no. III-55. Another example, in the Royal Ontario Museum, dated
13¡ in. (34 cm.) long Yuan-Ming dynasty, is illustrated in Homage to Heaven, Homage to
Earth, Toronto, 1992, p. 102, no. 53; and another dated Song dynasty
from the collection of E. B. Ellice-Clark, illustrated in the Catalogue
$50,000-70,000
of a Collection of Objects of Chinese Art, Burlington Fine Arts Club,
London, 1915, pl. XXXV, was sold at Christie’s Paris, 12 June 2012, lot
PROVENANCE:
Michael Goedhuis, London, 1996. 286. An example from the Water, Pine and Stone Retreat Collection
Marilyn Ackerman (1930-2012) Collection, Mamaroneck, New York. dated to the Ming dynasty was sold at Sotheby’s Hong Kong, 8 April
2013, lot 171.
This rare zoomorphic vessel illustrates the scholar’s interest in
antiquity and especially in ancient bronzes. Bronze vessels of this
form with inlaid silver and gold decoration are known from the 元/明 銅錯金銀犧尊
middle of the Warring States period (475-221 BC). An example
from Jiangsu, and now in the collection of the Nanjing Museum,
is illustrated in Zhongguo meishu quanji – Gongyi meishu bian - 5
- Qingtongqi (xia), Beijing, 1986, p. 126, no. 144. This bronze vessel
shares with the current example the small cover set into its back. The
examples from the Bronze Age appear to have found favor with the
Northern Song Emperor Huizong, who was a very keen antiquarian
and who instigated the publication of illustrated catalogues of the
items in his collection. One of these - the Xuanhe Bogu tulu (Xuanhe
Illustrated Catalogue of Antiques)- included an illustration of such an
early bronze vessel. While the original edition would not have been
readily available to later craftsmen, it was reprinted on a number of
occasions, and the illustration of this zoomorphic vessel appears, for
example, in the AD 1528 edition, known as the Bogu tulu.