Page 50 - 2021 March 15th Fine Chinese Paintings and Works of Art, Bonhams NYC New York

PROPERTY OF AN ENGLISH LADY PROPERTY OF AN ENGLISH LADY
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A SOAPSTONE FIGURE OF ‘SLEEPING’ LI BAI A CREAM SOAPSTONE FIGURE OF BUDAI
18th Century 17th/18th Century
The drunken poet peacefully slumbering against an over-turned wine The corpulent luohan in a relaxed pose with his robes falling open to
jar under his left side which raises his upper torso, the languid pose is expose his bare chest, his right arm resting on his raised right knee
liquidly-mirrored in the sinuous folds of his absurdly-elongated flowing and holding rosary beads, his left arm draped lazily over his sack,
sleeves, his out-stretched form, long droopy moustache and his with smiling expressive face, shaved head and delicately stippled
heavy-lidded closed eyes, his robe delicately incised with blossoms moustache, all lightly incised details picked out in black pigments and
on waves at the borders, waves and clouds at his plump belly, further gilt, the hems of his robes with blossom and lingzhi on a wave ground
clouds dotted around his robes and with lishui stripes at the hem. and with loosely-arranged flower-heads and clouds dispersed around
4in (10.1cm) across his clothing and to the reverse.
3 7/8in (9.8cm) high
$2,500 - 3,500
$4,000 - 6,000
十八世紀 壽山石雕李白像
十七/十八世紀 壽山石雕布袋和尚像
Provenance
Ralph M. Chait Galleries, New York For a similar soapstone figure of identical height dated to the Kangxi
period, see J.J.Lally & Co. Oriental Art, Chinese Art from the Scholar’s
來源 Studio, March-April, 2015, no. 14. Another example, with the figure
Ralph M. Chait Galleries, 紐約 shown in mirror image to ours, was offered at Sotheby’s, Paris, 11
December 2020, lot 158.
Another figure in a darker red soapstone but again depicting the
drunken poet Li Bai, was sold at Christie’s, New York, ‘Lacquer, Jade,
Bronze, Ink -The Irving Collection, Part II, 21 March 2019, lot 1184.
Another example, also from the Ralph M. Chait Galleries, New York,
sold at Sotheby’s, New York, ‘Property from the Collection of Marion
and Henry Bloch’, 24 June 2020, lot 1045; and another sold at
Sotheby’s, Hong Kong, 2-3 June 2016, lot 281.

For a figure in the Qing Court Collection, of slightly smaller-size and
carved from jade, see Gugong Bowuyuan Cang Wenwu Zhenpin
Quanji (Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum)
Jadeware III, Hong Kong, 1995, p. 124, no. 104. Another soapstone
recumbent figure described as a ‘big-bag mendicant, is illustrated
Gugong Bowuyuan Cang Wenwu Zhenpin Quanji (Complete Collection
of Treasures of the Palace Museum) Inscriptions and Sculptures,
Hong Kong, 2008, p. 218, no. 204.

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