Bottle ID: 761

< Previous page

CHEN ZHONGSAN, NATURE SCENE, HUANG CHENYEN

Date: 1909

Height: 60 mm

Glass, of flattened rectangular form with shoulders sloping to a cylindrical neck, and with a neatly carved oval footrim, painted on the inside using ink and watercolors, one main side with a katydid and ladybug on a cabbage which grows beside a grassy bank, with a dragonfly hovering above, inscribed with a dedication to brother Shoushan, dated jiyou year and signed Chen Zhongsan, followed by a painted seal Yi; the reverse with a snowy mountainous landscape scene of Huang Chenyen astride his mule, accompanied by his attendant carrying a branch of blossoming prunus, crossing a wooden hum-backed bridge.

Similar Examples:

Crane Collection no.s 398 and 448
Stevens, Bob C. The Collector's Book of Snuff Bottles, 1976, p. 246, no. 909

Provenance:

Bonhams New York, September 9, 2019, lot 105
A New York Private Collection
Sotheby's New York, March 15, 1984, part two, lot 208
The Mei Ling Collection, Holland
Sotheby's New York, March 26, 1982, part twp, lot 227
Bob C. Stevens Collection

Published and exhibited:

Stevens, Bob C. The Collector's Book of Snuff Bottles, New York, 1976, p. 246, no. 910
Mikimoto Hall, Tokyo, October 1978, Catalogue, no. 315

The nature scene is a scene that Chen Zhongsan has painted a number of times in his career, sometimes with a separate scene on each side, as is the case here and sometimes as a continous scene. On occasion he has also painted this scene in combination with the scene of Huang Chenyen's banishment from officialdom at the imperial court (see Crane Collection no. 168 for a discussion of the connection between these two images). However, every composition is unique even if it is taken from the same basic design and is well-executed with a boldness that characterizes his work.

 

< Back to full list