Bottle ID: 00440

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RED RUBY, CARVED W/BAND OF KUI DRAGONS

Date: 1730-1760

Height: 65 mm

Glass, of deep clear ruby-red tone, of slender elongated ovoid form with a neatly carved splayed footrim and everted lip, the interior extensively crizzled, carved in low relief with a concentric band running horizontally around the waist of the bottle, with a design of archaic stylized kui dragons.

Imperial, attributed to the Palace Workshops, Beijing.

Similar Examples:

Crane Collection nos. 126 and 319
Lawrence, Clare.  Miniature Masterpieces from the Middle Kingdom - The Monimar Collection of Chinese Snuff Bottles, 1996, pp. 236-237, no. 112.135.
Stevens, Bob C.  The Collector's Book of Snuff Bottles, 1976, p. 68, no. 186.
Moss, Hugh, Victor Graham and Ka Bo Tsang.  A Treasury of Chinese Snuff Bottles - The Mary and George Bloch Collection, 2002, Vol. 5, Part I, pp. 342-343, no. 827.

Provenance:

Asian Art Studio

Exhibited:

Annual Convention ICSBS Toronto, October 2007

This wonderful ruby-red glass bottle with its soft polish seems, at first glance, to have its counterparts in jade snuff bottles from the Imperial workshops.  An eighteenth century yellow nephrite bottle with a four character Qianlong nianzhi mark in the Collection of George and Mary Bloch, which has a similarly executed design, is described as being "beautifully crafted, particularly in the low relief carving which is crisply executed, and the surface polishing which is as smooth as possible."  The same description may be aptly applied to this example in glass.  It is very likely that the geometric pattern of the kui dragon band around the central portion of this bottle is a derivation from the dragon motifs that appear on Shang (16th - 11th C. BC) and Zhou (11th C. - 256 BC) bronze vessels.

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