Page 111 - Bonhams Chinese Works of Art February 2015 Knightsbridge

276 276
A pale green jade ‘peach’ brush 277
washer
17th/18th century
The translucent pale green stone formed as a
peach with exceptionally thin sides and heart-
shaped opening at the top, allowing water to
be poured out of the washer, the exterior very
finely carved with two elegant prunus flowers
set on intricately-intertwining foliate branches.
11.8cm (4 5/8in) wide

£800 - 1,200
CNY7,600 - 11,000 HK$9,500 - 14,000

Provenance
A European private collection and thence by
descent

Compare a related jade ‘peach’ washer,
dated late Ming Dynasty, 16th century, in the
Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, illustrated
by J.C.S. Lin in The Immortal Stone: Chinese
Jades from the Neolithic to the Twentieth
Century, London, 2009, pl.66. For another
related example but of foliate washer form
and with a crane, Ming Dynasty, see Studies
of the Collections of the National Museum of
China: Jade, Beijing, 2007, pl.216.

277
A pale celadon jade brushwasher
17th/18th century
A large open flowerhead forming the vessel,
carved in openwork relief around the exterior
with leafy, gnarled branches of flowering
prunus and lingzhi, the stone of pale celadon
hue with some creamy and pale russet
inclusions.
13cm (5.1/8in) long.

£2,500 - 4,000
CNY24,000 - 38,000 HK$30,000 - 47,000

asian art | 109