Page 62 - Youngman jade Collection Hong Kong March 3 2019 Sotheby's

3419
A JADE FIGURE OF A BEAR
SHANG DYNASTY
finely worked from a variegated yellowish and olive-green stone mottled with beige and dark striations, depicting a bear resting
on its haunches with the forelimbs wrapped around the bent knees, all below a large head with a slightly open mouth revealing
its tongue and surmounted by a pair of pointed ears, the rounded back of the figure decorated overall with motifs of hooks and
scrollwork, the back of the head pierced with an aperture
商 玉熊
4.2 cm, 1⅝ in.
HK$ 600,000-800,000
US$ 76,500-102,000

PROVENANCE 來源
Alvin Lo Oriental Art Ltd, New York 春源齋，紐約
LITERATURE 出版
Robert P. Youngman, The Youngman Collection 羅伯特．楊門，《楊門藏玉：中國玉器．新石器時代至
of Chinese Jades from Neolithic to Qing, Chicago, 清代》，芝加哥，2008年，圖版32
2008, pl. 32.

Modelled in the round from a small pebble, jade animal sculptures of this type are among the earliest depictions of animals
ever to be made in jade. These sculptures are discussed by Jessica Rawson in Chinese Jade from the Neolithic to the Qing,
London, 1995, p. 207, who suggests that they were first conceived around the time of Lady Hao, when an interest in exotic
animals was developed.
Three similar jade bears were recovered from the tomb of Lady Hao, wife of King Wu Ding (r. 1324-1265 B.C.), at Yinxu,
Anyang, and illustrated in Yinxu yuqi/ The Jades from Yinxu, Beijing, 1981, pls 80 and 81. Another jade bear from the
Mottahedeh collection, included in the exhibition Chinese Jade Throughout the Ages, Victoria and Albert Museum, London,
1975, cat. no. 44, was sold in our New York rooms, 4th November 1978, lot 162; and another from the collection of Grenville
L. Winthrop, now in the Harvard Art Museums, Cambridge, was included in the exhibition Ancient Chinese Jades, Fogg Art
Museum, Harvard University, Cambridge, 1975, cat. no. 305. See also two jade bears recovered from the Western Zhou
tomb of the Marquis of Jin and his wife, in Quwo county, Shanxi province, and illustrated in Zhongguo chutu yuqi quanji [The
complete collection of jades unearthed in China], vol. 3, pls 125 and 126.

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