Page 284 - 2018 Hong Kong Important Chieese Art

Originally compiled by Lou Shou in AD 1145, the Gengzhi tu of his writing. The Qianlong Emperor, propagating himself as
[Pictures of Tilling and Weaving] is a depiction of the different a glorious descendant in line to the generations of enlightened
stages of agriculture and sericulture, used as reference rulers, was determined to create a version paying homage to
material to farming. It was also conceived as a metaphor for a his predecessors. In 1739, he commissioned court painters
prosperous, ordered Confucian society under a magnanimous to make copies of the Kangxi album, and composed his own
and benevolent ruler. In the Qing dynasty, this was further poetic verses in addition to his grandfather and father’s
developed into an important subject to glorify the golden contributions, which are included on the pages adjacent to the
age under the justified governance of the Manchus. Hence illustrations and enclosed within characteristic borders of red
the three Emperors during the pinnacle of the Qing dynasty, dragons on the present album.
namely Kangxi, Yongzheng and Qianlong, had commissioned
Stylistically, the architectonic treatment of the scenes on
various editions of these scenes to be printed.
the present albums demonstrates a continued interest in
Derived quintessentially from original woodblock prints Western linear perspective, pioneered by the Kangxi Emperor
commissioned by the Kangxi Emperor in 1696, after a painted and further galvanised during the Qianlong period. Realistic
album by the court painter Jiao Bingzhen (1689-1726), the depiction of facial expressions, more accurate interpretation of
present albums preserved the original format with a preface the human anatomy and the use of Western three-dimensional
and poems composed by the Kangxi Emperor in the manner modelling are also characteristic of 18th-century pictorial
aesthetics.

282 SOTHEBY’S 蘇富比