A RARE INLAID ZITAN BRUSHPOT

Estimated Value:

20.000 € - 30.000 €

Result:

181.300 € incl. Premium and VAT

Description:

China, late Ming dynasty
H. 19,2 cm
Of bracket-lobed form, decorated with flowering peony and prunus inlaid with mother of pearl, stained horn, coral, with a poetic inscription, four seal marks: wumen, shen yiru, kehong and xueju (Sun Kehong 1553 - 1611), below a thin band of keyfret at the rim in metal inlay. Weight: 1,351 kg.
Privy Councillor Herrmann Dobrikow (Beijing, d. 1928), sold by a family member through China Bohlken, Sylt, on July 16th, 1987 to a Berlin private collection (invoice preserved) according to notes
Sun Kehong (孫克弘 1533-1611), zi Yunzhi (允執), hao Xueju (雪居), was a native of Songjiang (part of present-day Shanghai) and the son of the Minister of Rites, Sun Cheng’en (孫承恩 1481-1561). During his lifetime Sun Kehong was highly regarded as a painter, calligrapher, and book collector. His skill as a maker of wood scholar’s articles particularly renowned for his wireinlaid calligraphy is recorded by Wu Lüzhen (吳履震, active circa 1650) in 五茸志逸隨筆 Wurong shiyi suibi (Notes Gleaned from the Record of Marvels of Wurong): 孫雪居以紫檀仿古製刻三雅杯銀絲填嵌漢篆字 which may be translated as “Sun Xueju used zitan to emulate ancient craftwork and once carved a ‘Three Elegances Cup’ with silver wire inlaid Han zhuan characters.” Compare the zitan square brush pot in the collection of the Palace Museum, Beijing, inlaid with very similar blossoming prunus branches and silver-wire seal script calligraphy with an inscribed poem, followed by the artist’s signature Xueju 雪居 (Owner of Snow Dwelling), illustrated in Zhongguo meishu fenlei quanji: Zhongguo zhu, mu, ya, jiao qi quanji (Compendium of Chinese Art: Chinese Carving of Bamboo, Wood, Ivory, and Horn), Vol. 3, Beijing, 2009, p. 223, no. 180, with a very brief biography of Sun Kehong. Compare also the zitan covered cup and the zitan hexagonal cup in the Palace Museum, Beijing, both with very similar silver-wire inlaid calligraphy, key-fret borders and signed with Sun Kehong’s various names, illustrated in Gugong diaoke zhencui (The Palace Museum Collection of Elite Carvings), Beijing, 2002, pp. 98-99, nos. 63 and 64, described as late Ming dynasty. This brushpot is of particularly high quality in that the carved inlay is of top quality and the bracket-lobed shape is unusual and quite hard to carve to this form. Technically it would be quite difficult for the inlay to span the different angles of the various lobes, but this has been achieved with great success - Some losses of inlay, minor old repairs, slightly chipped

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