Page 83 - September 21 2021 Curtis collections snuff bottles Bonhams NYC

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A FINE AND RARE MOLDED BISCUIT PORCELAIN SQUARE Chen Guozhi was one of great masters of porcelain carving and as is
CYLINDER SNUFF BOTTLE noted by Hugh Moss, Victor Graham and Ka Bo Tsang, The Art of the
Chen Guozhi Chinese Snuff Bottle, The J & J Collection, Vol. 1, 1993, p. 416-417,
Of square cylinder shape with cylindrical neck and deep square foot, no. 249, a little of his career can be gleaned from nineteenth-century
the exquisite decoration partially molded, partially carved and possibly literary sources. He appears in Zhao Zhiqian’s book on snuff and snuff
with some applied decoration, each side with bordered panel with two bottles of the late nineteenth century, where it is noted that he was a
of the eight Daoist emblems set on a cloud ground and very lightly ‘native of Qimen, who carved porcelain bottles with the technique of
brushed in a clear glaze, with a four-character intaglio seal mark Chen the painter, so pieces by him are absolutely unique in the whole world’.
Guozhi zuo. He is also mentioned by Jin Wuxiang, who published his Suxiang suibi
2 11/16in (6.7cm) high, stopper (Casual jottings amid the fragrance of grain) in the Guangxu period,
where he notes that Chen Guozhi was ‘Of great renown at this time,
$3,000 - 4,000 his work was never lightly undertaken, every piece being valued at ten
pieces of gold’. Finally, Chen is also mentioned in the Guwan zhinan
(Handbook of Chinese Antiquity) of 1943, as a ‘refined artisan and
陳國治 素胎白瓷模刻八寶吉祥圖鼻煙壺 《陳國治作》款 skilful workman’.

For a splendid turquoise-glazed and molded landscape porcelain
bottle by the same artist, see Bonhams, Hong Kong, The Mary and
George Bloch Collection, Part I, 28 May 2010, lot 81. The catalogue
entry includes a lengthy biography of the artist and comparable
examples.

THE EMILY BYRNE CURTIS COLLECTION OF CHINESE SNUFF BOTTLES | 81