Page 342 - Christies King St. FINE CHINESE CERAMICS AND WORKS OF ART

PROPERTY OF A EUROPEAN LADY

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A MAGNIFICENT AND RARE LARGE HUANGHUALI RECESSED-LEG TABLE, PINGTOUAN
MING DYNASTY, 17TH CENTURY

明十七世紀 黃花梨平頭案

The long single-panel top is set within a wide frame with ‘ice-plate’ edge and is supported on robust
recessed legs of round section joined by a plain apron and rounded rectangular spandrels. The front and
back legs joined by double oval-section stretchers at each end. The wood has a warm honey
tone throughout.

32 in. (82 cm.) high, 85 in. (216 cm.) wide, 19º in. (49 cm.) deep

£200,000-300,000 $310,000-460,000
€280,000-410,000

PROVENANCE:

Acquired in Hong Kong in the early 1980s.

The recessed-leg table is one of the most prevalent forms of Chinese furniture. This style of table,
known in Chinese as pingtouan, is an example of furniture intended for practical use.

The pingtouan form, with its simple lines, rounded legs, and pairs of stretchers, is also among the
most successful and recognizable forms found in classical Chinese furniture construction. The basic
proportions were adapted to make large painting tables, smaller tables, benches and stools. This form
of table is referred to in the Lu Ban Jing as a ‘Character One Table’ due to its similarity in profle to the
single horizontal stroke of the Chinese character for the number one.

The present table is an example of a narrow version of the form. It would have most likely been placed
against a wall to function as an altar table or as a display table for ornamental objects and utilizes a long,
single-panel top of lustrous huanghuali which would have been quite expensive to acquire even during
the 17th century.

For an informative discussion regarding the importance of the Chinese side table and altar table as an
indispensable part of the classical Chinese household see Sarah Handler, Austere Luminosity of Chinese
Classical Furniture, Berkeley, 2001, pp. 224-238. The author explains that Chinese households would
utilize these tables as either altars in the home or as side tables for the display of objects and treasured
family possessions. Usually placed in the main hall of the household, these tables would naturally be
the focal point of the room. Handler notes, “Although the essential function of these tables throughout
history has been to display beautiful valuables to family or to gods, the displays changes with the times.”
Thus, although the individual types of objects may have undergone change over the centuries since the
present table was created, this magnifcent example of the form may continue to serve part of its initial
function to display the precious objects and treasures of the modern family’s world.

For a similar, although larger (89 in. wide) huanghuali recessed-leg table see Wang Shixiang and Curtis
Evarts, Masterpieces from the Museum of Classical Chinese Furniture, Chicago, 1995, p. 114, no. 54,
of late 16th-early 17th century dating. See, also, a larger example (89 in. wide) illustrated by Robert
D. Jacobsen and Nicholas Grindley in Classical Chinese Furniture in the Minneapolis Institute of Arts,
Minneapolis, 1999, pp. 122-123, no. 40, where it is dated to the 17th century. A smaller example (71 in.
wide) is illustrated in Gustav Ecke, Chinese Domestic Furniture, Tokyo, 1962, pl. 46, no. 36.

來源:歐洲私人珍藏；1980年代初購自香港

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