Page 11 - September 23 to 24 Important Chinese Art Christie's NYC

Fig. 3. The present jade
tiger pendant featured in
the exhibition catalogue,
3000 Years of Chinese
Jade, Arden Gallery, New
York, 1939, p. 97, no. 66.
圖三 本拍品於《3000
Years of Chinese Jade》之
著錄，Arden Gallery ，紐
約，1939年，頁97，編
號66。
Fig. 4. C. F. Yau, circa
1940. Signed ‘Iraida/NY’
in red ink.
圖四 姚昌復，1940年前
後。Iraida/NY紅墨落款。

were reluctant to remove stone merely to achieve uniform thickness in 1 Measuring sixteen centimeters in length, a Shang jade tiger pendant excavated at
the finished piece. They considered jade to be the most precious of all Anyang and now in the Anyang Museum of Art is longer and thicker than the present
materials, prizing it above gold, silver, and other materials; that reverence one; despite the quality of its carving, however, its stone lacks the quality of the
present one. See: Guojia wenwuju [National Cultural Artifacts Bureau], ed., Zhongguo
for jade, or chongyu—which some anthropologists consider a defining
wenwu jinghua daquan: Jin, yin, yu, shi juan [A Compendium of Chinese Art: Gold,
characteristic of Chinese culture—speaks to the desire to preserve as much
Silver, Jade, Stone Volume], (Hong Kong: Commercial Press), 1994, p. 24, no. 73.
of the original stone as possible. 2 See: http://www.kaogu.cn/cn/kaoguyuandi/kaogusuibi/2018/0328/61481.html
3 See: https://www.penn.museum/collections/object_images.php?irn=240676
The “slice mark” through the tiger’s face on one side of this pendant is an 4 See: https://www.penn.museum/collections/object_images.php?irn=14380
artifact of slicing the original raw material—probably a large pebble or small 5 See: Uchida (Nanba) Junko, “Inkyō shutsudo no iwayuru kotsushi ni tsuite (jō)” [A
boulder of nephrite—into discrete, flat segments that could be shaped and Study of Carved Bone Objects Excavated at the Yinxu Tomb HPKM1001], Part 1,
decorated as pendants and other objects. Because of the desire to preserve Kodai bunka, December 1995, vol. 47, no. 9, p. 26, fig.1.
6 See: Zhongguo shehui kexue yuan kaogu yanjiusuo bianzhu [Institute of Archaeology,
as much as possible of the valuable stone, the slice mark was not smoothed
Chinese Academy of Social Sciences], ed., Yinxu Fuhao Mu [Tomb of Lady Hao at
over, let alone abraded away; in that sense, uniformity of thickness was
Yinxu in Anyang], 1st edition (Beijing: Cultural Relics Publishing House), 1980, p. 161,
sacrificed to preservation of material. fig. 84, no. 12 and color plate 28, no. 2 (358).
7 For information on Lady Fu Hao and her tomb, see: National Palace Museum, ed.,
Not only large and superbly carved, this exquisite jade tiger pendant has King Wu Ding and Lady Hao: Art and Culture of the Late Shang Dynasty, 1st ed.,
a long and distinguished pedigree that can be traced back to its first (Taipei: National Palace Museum), 2012.
publication in 1939, when it was loaned by C. F. Yau (Chang Foo Yau) 8 See: Zhongguo shehui kexue yuan, ed., Yinxu Fuhao Mu, 1980, color plate 104, no. 3 (392).
9 See: Zhongguo shehui kexue yuan, ed., Yinxu Fuhao Mu, 1980, color plate 120, no. 3 (383).
President of the prominent Chinese art dealer Tonying & Company, Inc., to an
10 See: See: Tianjin bowuguan [Tianjin Museum], ed., Tianjin bowuguan cangyu [Jade
exhibition of Chinese jade carving at Arden Gallery in New York. (Figs. 3 and
Wares Collected by the Tianjin Museum], in the series Tianjin bowuguan jingpin xilie
4) Moreover, with kinship to a jade tiger pendant excavated from the tomb
tuji, (Beijing: Wenwu chubanshe), 2012, p. 45, no. 028.
of Lady Fu Hao, wife of a Shang king, and with close aesthetic and stylistic 11 See: National Palace Museum, ed., King Wu Ding and Lady Hao, 2012, p. 89.
ties to jades, chimes, and engraved bones recovered from other Shang 12 See: Zhongguo shehui kexue yuan, ed., Yinxu Fuhao Mu, 1980, color plate 135, no. 2 (409).
royal tombs, this pendant takes its place among the most celebrated luxury 13 See: https://www.christies.com/lot/lot-a-jade-carving-of-a-tiger-
objects from the late Shang period. A jade of exquisite beauty, this tiger shang-6294077/?
pendant is truly the rarest of treasures. 14 See: Maxwell K. Hearn, Ancient Chinese Art: The Ernest Erickson Collection, (New
York: Metropolitan Museum of Art), 1987, pp. 77 and 79, no. 117 (1985.214.120).
Robert D. Mowry
Alan J. Dworsky Curator of Chinese Art Emeritus,
Harvard Art Museums, and Senior Consultant, Christie’s
1 河南安陽出土的商代虎形玉珮長16毫米，現藏安陽博物館，它比本拍品更長且厚，其雕工亦精，但玉質遜於本拍品， 8 中國社會科學院編著《殷墟婦好墓》第1版彩色圖版104編號3 (392)。
圖見國家文物局編著《中國文物精華大全：金銀玉石卷》頁24編號73 (香港：商務印書館，1994)。 9 中國社會科學院編著《殷墟婦好墓》第1版彩色圖版120編號3 (383) (北京：文物出版社，新華書店1980年發行)。
2 參見http://www.kaogu.cn/cn/kaoguyuandi/kaogusuibi/2018/0328/61481.html。 10 天津博物館編著《天津博物館精品系列圖集》之《天津博物館藏玉》頁45編號28 (北京：文物出版社，2012)。
3 參見https://www.penn.museum/collections/object_images.php?irn=240676。 11 前述國立故宮博物院於2012年編著的《商王武丁與后婦好》頁89。
4 參見https://www.penn.museum/collections/object_images.php?irn=14380。 12 中國社會科學院編著《殷墟婦好墓》第1版彩色圖版135編號2 (409) (北京：文物出版社，新華書店發行於1980年)。同
5 內田 (難波) 純子論文<殷墟出土のいわゆる骨柶について (上)>，發表於《古代文化》1995年9月卷47第9號頁26圖1。 一墓址還出土了一例孔雀石虎，其虎頸亦飾盾形斑紋，圖見前述著作彩色圖版175編號4 (401)。
6 中國社會科學院考古研究所編著《殷墟婦好墓》第1版頁161圖84編號12與彩版28編號2 (358) (北京：文物出版 13 詳見https://www.christies.com/lot/lot-a-jade-carving-of-a-tiger-shang-6294077/?。
社，1980)。 14 詳見Maxwell K. Hearn著作《Ancient Chinese Art: The Ernest Erickson Collection》頁77及79編號117 (館藏號1985.214.120)
7 關於婦好及其墓葬詳情，請見國立故宮博物院編著《商王武丁與后婦好：殷商盛世文化藝術特展》初版 (台北：國 (紐約：大都會藝術博物館，1987)
立故宮博物院，2012)。

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