Page 44 - Christie's London China Trade Paintings Kelton Collection

*23
CHINESE SCHOOL, CIRCA 1810
Chinese Costumes: oficials and their consorts of various ranks, merchants, archers and swordsmen
bodycolour and gold paint on paper watermarked ‘J WHATMAN / 1805’
each 19 x 14√in. (48.2 x 37.7cm.)
thirteen framed, thirty-six unframed (49)
£30,000-50,000 US$38,000-62,000
€34,000-56,000
PROVENANCE:
Anon. sale, Christie's, New York, 15 Oct. 1986, lot 47 (which comprised ffty drawings).
The watercolours from the same Canton workshop as the Samuel Boddington album of c.1796 in the Victoria and Albert Museum,
(7868), for which see Clunas, pp.43-9 ('The paintings give a view of Chinese costume in mid-Qing which is considerably less
fanciful than that given of the Chinese landscape in the scenes of porcelain manufacturing. And yet, for all their surface accuracy,
these fgures remain part of the European image of China, they are not China as viewed by the Chinese. ... The various street
crafts of Mason's Costume of China, like the individual fgures here, are 'types', collections of which, whether 'Street Cries of
London' or 'Costume of the Tirol' were staples of English printmakers and publishers in this period. They tell us something not
only about Georgian curiosity towards the world, but also about its urge to classify and categorise. China was to be understood
by enumerating its 'types', and a whole civilisation was to be mastered by reducing its complex multifariousness to a more easily
assimilated number of images.')

42 In addition to the hammer price, a Buyer’s Premium (plus VAT) is payable. Other taxes and/or an Artist Resale Royalty
fee are also payable if the lot has a tax or λ symbol. Check Section D of the Conditions of Sale at the back of this catalogue.