Bottle ID: 799

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REALGAR, IMITATION, FLYING CRANES

Date: 1750-1820

Height: 61 mm

A glass snuff bottle, of flattened oval form with shoulders sloping to a cylindrical neck and with a neatly carved oval footrim, the glass of swirly orange and red tones in imitation of realgar, carved in relief with a continuous scene of flying cranes, some carrying rods in their beaks above waves and rockwork and beneath scrolling clouds, one side with the sun rising above the waves, the reverse with a bat flying amid the cranes near to a pavilion. 
Imperial, attributed to the Palace Workshops, Beijing.

Similar Examples:

Crane Collection, no.s 268 and 927 
Christie's New York, March 21, 2002, lot 22, The Blanche B. Exstein Collection

Provenance:

Christie’s New York, March 24, 2022, Lot 859 
Rachelle R. Holden Collection, New York 
Sotheby’s New York, March 15, 1984, lot 48 
The Mei Ling Collection, (Dr. Bons, The Netherlands)

Published:

JICSBS, Summer 1993, p. 6, fig. 11 
R. Holden, Rivers and Mountains Far From the World – The Rachelle R. Holden Collection, A Personal Commentary, New York, 1994, pp. 104-105, no. 39

 

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