Page 135 - Irving Collection Part II Chinese Art

1182 A SMALL PUDDINGSTONE FIGURE OF A LION
CHINA, TANG DYNASTY (AD 618-907)

Shown seated facing forward and with front legs stifly braced on The present fgure is carved from limestone conglomerate and has
the rectangular base, its mane fnely incised and its mouth open in a particularly delicate proportions, with a beautiful matrix of faked
ferce roar pebble-like inclusions of varying sizes within the stone and a soft,
silky patina. Limestone conglomerate has a long history of imperial
5¬ in. (14.3 cm.) high
appreciation and was incorporated as a building material in the Ming
$12,000-15,000
and Qing imperial palaces, most notably as foor tiling in the Qianlong
PROVENANCE Garden in the northeast section of the Forbidden City, Beijing.
Eastern Pacifc Co., Hong Kong, 1988. Limestone conglomerate carvings, such as the current example, are
The Irving Collection, no. 550. known to have been collected by the Qianlong emperor and are likely
to have inspired these puddingstone foorings, which are recorded as
This rare and charming puddingstone fgure of a lion is one of being installed by special order of the emperor himself.
the earliest examples of the usage of puddingstone as a material
in Chinese art. “Puddingstone” is a blanket term covering a wide Compare the present fgure to a similarly seated puddingstone lion
variety of conglomerate stones made up of pebbles held together by of larger size (9Ω in. high), dated to the Tang dynasty, 8th century,
sedimentary or siliceous rock. Historically, two types of puddingstone in the collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York,
with diferent mineralogical make-up were used in a Chinese art illustrated by Laurence Roberts in Treasures from The Metropolitan
context. The frst type is a limestone conglomerate, thought to be Museum of Art, New York, 1979, p. 39, no. 28. Another example from
locally sourced from various geographical origins within China, and the Eumorfopoulos Collection, London, is illustrated by Leigh Ashton
has a long-standing tradition in Chinese art lasting some 1,200 years. in An Introduction to the Study of Chinese Sculpture, New York, 1924,
The other type is a quartz conglomerate, which was likely to have been pl. L.
imported to China no earlier than the Qing dynasty and was used for
唐 抱子石獅
snuf bottles, as well as intricate auspicious carvings.

133