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AN EARLY INSIDE-PAINTED ROCK CRYSTAL SNUFF BOTTLE
Gan Xuanwen, Lingnan, 1810-1825
Signed Gan Xuan and with the hao Gugang yuzhe
Extremely well painted in ink and muted tones, one main face with
a mountainous river landscape, a scholar and attendant crossing a
bridge beneath a pine tree in the foreground below the signature Gan
Xuan, a well-written clerical script poetic inscription on the reverse face
followed by the sobriquet Gugang yuzhe; stopper.
2 3/8in (6cm) high
$8,000 - 12,000
1810-1825 甘烜文 嶺南 水晶内畫山水高士圖鼻煙壺
《甘》《烜》《古岡魚者》款

Provenance:
Alice B. McReynolds
Sotheby’s, New York, The Alice B. McReynolds Collection, Part II, 16
April 1985, lot 174

Exhibited:
International Chinese Snuff Bottle Society Convention, Waldorf Astoria,
New York, 5-9 November 2013, no. 32

Gan Xuanwen used a variety of names on his extant bottles. He
adopted a number of hao, or literary aliases, including several which
relate to his place of birth, as in our example Gugang yuzhe (fisherman
of Gugang). Association with the country pursuits of fishing and wood-
cutting or gathering are typical literati affectations to link themselves
with the simple life of the farmer and at distance from the intellectual
rigors of the scholar.

For other similar Gan Xuanwen bottles with landscape scenes, see
Bonhams, Hong Kong, Snuff Bottles from the Mary and George Bloch
Collection: Part I, 28 May 2010, lot 34; Bonhams, Hong Kong, The
Paula Braga Collection, 24 November 2012, lot 87; and another in
Bonhams, New York, 12 September 2016, lot 9108.

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