Page 204 - Christies September 13 to 14th Fine Chinese Works of Art New York

PROPERTY FROM AN IMPORTANT PRIVATE COLLECTION
1223
A SUPERB AND EXTREMELY RARE CARVED RED
LACQUER RECTANGULAR TRAY
YUAN DYNASTY, FIRST HALF 14TH CENTURY
The tray is exquisitely carved through thick layers of red lacquer with two long-tailed
pheasants swooping amidst dense foliage with peony blossoms on the interior,
the exterior sides with a classic scroll, and the base is lacquered black.
14Ω in. (36.7 cm.) long, Japanese wood box
$180,000-220,000

PROVENANCE
Private collection, Japan.
Christie’s Hong Kong, 30 November 2011, lot 3050.

The present tray is exceptional for the superb quality of carving and its unusual form. Only
one other closely comparable example appears to have been published. A tray of almost
identical size and design, but with the addition of a Yang Mao zao mark incised on the inner
side of the foot, was sold at Christie’s Hong Kong, 30 May 2005, lot 1335.
Another closely related rectangular tray with similar birds and fowers, from the Tokugawa
Art Museum, Nagoya, is illustrated in Karamono, Imported Lacquerwork - Chinese, Korean
and Ryukyuan (Okinawa), Japan, 1997, no. 19. The composition on the Tokugawa example is
read horizontally, while that on the current tray is vertically oriented.
The subject of two birds in fight amidst fowers and foliage was very popular during the Song
and Yuan dynasties, and can be found most often in a circular compositions as on a dish or round round
box, where the bodies of the birds and their long fowing tail feathers form a circular motion. See, n. See,
for example, the dish from the Tokugawa Art Museum, included in the same exhibition,
and illustrated in the Catalogue, ibid., no. 21.
元十四世紀初 剔紅錦雞牡丹紋長方盤

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