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A PALE CELADON JADE ‘PRUNUS’ VASE AND 清乾隆 青白玉雕梅蘭紋蓋瓶
COVER, QING DYNASTY, QIANLONG PERIOD
來源
zitan stand (3) Widener 收藏
Height 8 in., 20.3 cm
展覽
PROVENANCE
《Ninety Jades for 90 Years》，馬錢特，倫敦，2015
Widener Collection. 年，編號80

EXHIBITED
Ninety Jades for 90 Years, Marchant, London, 2015, cat. no. 80.
The plum blossom or prunus, meihua, is the first flower to
bloom each year. Symbolising spring, perseverance, purity
and renewal, it is traditionally considered one of the ‘Three
Friends of Winter’ (san han san you) alongside pine and
bamboo. Masterfully carved with swirling branches, the
present prunus is depicted amongst scholars’ rocks (shoushi)
with the mythical lingzhi fungus and narcissus (shuixian)
blooms growing alongside. This combination is itself a
celebrated and auspicious motif forming the rebus, zhixian
zhushou, ‘May the Fungus Immortal grant you long life’.
A number of similar vases are known, treasured in the Qing
Court collection and preserved in the Palace Museums.
Compare an example illustrated in The Complete Collection
of Treasures of the Palace Museum. Jade Ware (III), Hong
Kong, 1995, pl. 67; another featuring closely related
rockwork in the Compendium of Collections in the Palace
Museum, Jade, vol. 10: Qing Dynasty, Beijing, 2011, pl. 38;
and another preserved in Taipei, illustrated in Jade: Ch’ing
Dynasty Treasures, from the National Museum of History,
Taiwan, no. 113, p. 180.
The family and descendants of Peter Arrell Brown Widener
(1834-1915) and his wife Hannah Josephine Dunton (1836-
1896) were from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and were one of
the wealthiest families in the United States. In 1883, Widener
was part of the founding partnership of the Philadelphia
Traction Company and used the great wealth accumulated
from that business to become a founding organiser of U.S.
Steel and the American Tobacco Company. Their legacy
includes the Widener Library at Harvard University and
the Widener University in Chester, Pennsylvania. Their
descendants became one the prominent factors in American
thoroughbred horseracing history, as well as founding
benefactors of the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D. C.

⊖ $ 40,000-60,000

422 SOTHEBY’S COMPLETE CATALOGUING AVAILABLE AT SOTHEBYS.COM/N11744 MARCHANT – CHINESE JADES 423