Page 44 - September 21 2021 MAnfred Arnold Collection snuff bottles Bonhams NYC

429
AN INSIDE-PAINTED MINIATURE GLASS SNUFF BOTTLE
Attributed to Ma Shaoxuan
Signed and dated jihai year, corresponding to 1899
Of rounded rectangular shape, one main face painted with two felines
(sometimes identified as badgers) playing together, beneath the title
Shuanghuan tu (Double Happiness painting), the other face with a
twenty-one-character poem, followed by the signature, date and seal
Shao, in negative seal script; stopper.
1 1/2in (3.8cm) high

$5,000 - 7,000
己亥年（1899） 傳馬少宣 玻璃内畫「雙歡圖」微型鼻煙壺

Provenance:
Arts of China, Hong Kong, 1986
Mary and George Bloch, Hong Kong
Bonhams, Hong Kong, Snuff Bottles from the Mary & George Bloch
Collection: Part V, 27 May 2012, lot 100

Literature:
Robert W. L. Kleiner, Chinese Snuff Bottles from the Collection of Mary
and George Bloch at the Galleries of Sydney L. Moss, Ltd., Hong
Kong, 1987, no. 286
Robert Kleiner, Chinese Snuff Bottles from the Collection of Mary and
George Bloch, London, British Museum, 1995, no. 412

Exhibited:
Sydney L. Moss Ltd., London, October 1987
Creditanstalt, Vienna, May-June 1993
British Museum, London, June-November 1995
Israel Museum, Jerusalem, July-November 1997
International Chinese Snuff Bottle Society Convention, Waldorf Astoria,
New York, 5-9 November 2013, no. 141

See an example illustrated by Ma Zhengshan, Inside-Painted Snuff
Bottle Artist Ma Shaoxuan (1867-1939), Baltimore, 1997, p. 45, fig.
23 and also illustrated by Hugh Moss, Victor Graham and Ka Bo
Tsang, Treasury, Vol. 4, Part 2, Inside Painted, Hong Kong, 2000, pp.
376-377, no. 579 and dated to the spring of 1897. It was later sold
at Sotheby’s, Hong Kong, The Mary and George Bloch Collection,
Part VIII, 26 May 2014, lot 1135, where it is described as both
‘playing cats’ and ‘badgers’. The Chinese word for badger is huan
which is homophonous with huan (happiness or joy) which appears
in the title inscribed above the image. However, the depictions, whilst
bearing a passing resemblance in color (black and white), do not have
features corresponding to badgers, such as distinctive mask-like face
markings, pointed snout and short legs, but are more easily identified
as feline.

See another example sold at Bonhams, New York, 13 November
2017, lot 8016 and another at Bonhams, Hong Kong, The Mary and
George Bloch Collection, Part V, 27 May 2012, lot 100 attributed to the
family of Ma Shaoxuan.

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