Page 284 - Important Chinese Art Hong Kong Sotheby's April 2017

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AN IMPERIAL BEIJING ENAMEL YELLOW- 清乾隆 御製銅胎畫北京琺瑯開光式西洋人物圖鼻煙壺
GROUND ‘EUROPEAN SUBJECT’ SNUFF 《乾隆年製》款
BOTTLE
MARK AND PERIOD OF QIANLONG 來源：
巴黎德魯奧大樓 Etude Jutheau 拍賣，1984年7月2日，
the ovoid body with a flat lip and slightly recessed, slightly 封面
convex foot surrounded by a protruding flat footrim, painted in
famille-rose enamels on each main side with a panel enclosing
a European subject, one depicting a bare-breasted woman
wearing a scarf before a landscape with cottages nestled
amongst green fields, the other with an old man and a young
boy carrying a dog in their arms, all encircled by large floral
blooms reserved on a bright yellow enamel ground, the rim
and the foot with a white band, the interior of the neck with an
additional metal lining below the lip, the base enamelled white
and inscribed with a four-character mark in blue, all exposed
metal gilt; stopper
6 cm, 2⅜ in.

PROVENANCE

Hôtel Drouot, Paris, Etude Millon Jutheau, 2nd July 1984,
illustrated on the cover.

HK$ 700,000-900,000
US$ 90,500-116,000

Another Beijing enamel snuff bottle in the Palace Museum, Snuff bottles of this high quality enamelling, especially
Beijing, similarly decorated with a panel on each side those with decorative motifs including European subjects so
decorated with European subjects, one with a bare-breasted favoured by the Qianlong Emperor, were not only produced in
lady with a child, the reverse with similar iconography Beijing, but also by private enamellers working at Guangzhou.
of an old man playing with a dog, possibly derived from A European-subject snuff bottle from the Qing court collection
contemporaneous European prints, is illustrated in The and still in Beijing, depicting ladies in a rustic landscape, is
Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum. Snuff preserved in the Palace Museum, Beijing, and illustrated in The
Bottles, Hong Kong, 2003, p. 112, no. 164. See also an example Complete Collection of Treasures, op.cit., p. 115, pl. 168, where
with near-identical decoration, including the design of flowers it is divulged that it can be dated to 1779, as it is recorded that
on a yellow-ground at the sides, in the Water, Pine and Stone a customs supervisor in Guangzhou, Tu Minga, presented the
Retreat collection, illustrated on e-yaji.com, no. 21.3.610. Qianlong Emperor with a set of such snuff bottles, all created in
Guangshou. Such commissions by high officials clearly looking
For another Beiing enamel snuff bottle sold at auction, see for the most desirable gifts to present to the Emperor were
another rare example featuring bare-breasted ladies from clearly popular at the Court.
the collection of Joe Grimberg, enamelled on both sides with
scenes of European shepherdesses, sold in our New York
rooms, 14th September 2010, lot 174. The rich floral design
on yellow on the current bottles is also reminiscent of that on
the Beijing enamel ‘mille-fleurs’ snuff bottle from the Mary and
George Bloch collection, sold at Bonhams Hong Kong, 28th
May 2010, lot 77.

Mark
282 SOTHEBY’S 蘇富比