Footnotes

• Treasury 6, no. 1352
  
  瓷胎模製綠釉渡江圖鼻煙壺
  心泉(擬陳國治)，景德鎮，刻「大清道光年製」篆款，1821年製
  
  An inscribed bluish emerald-green porcelain 'crossing the river' snuff bottle
  
  Variegated bluish emerald-green and colourless glazes on porcelain; with a flat lip and recessed flat foot surrounded by a protruding, flattened footrim; carved with a waterside mountainous landscape scene wrapped around one main and two narrow sides and partially onto the other main side, with three scholars standing beneath a willow, one holding a folding fan, their young servant standing nearby between the two picnic boxes he has been carrying on a shoulder pole as a boat with railings along the sides and a roof overhead in the middle section is sculled in from the right by a boatman as a fourth scholar sits in the prow fishing, inscribed on the other main side in relief running script, 'Made in the late spring month in the xinsi year while sojourning at Zhushan in Xinping, by Mr Xinquan', followed by two seals, one in relief seal script, Xinquan, the other in incised seal script, shi zuo (together, 'Made by Mr Xinquan'); the foot inscribed in incised seal script Da Qing Daoguang nian zhi ('Made in the Daoguang period of the Qing dynasty'); the exterior surfaces, except the footrim, all covered in emerald-green glaze, the inner neck and interior with a colourless glaze
  Xinquan (probably Chen Guozhi), Jingdezhen, late spring 1921
  Height: 6.05 cm
  Mouth/lip: 0.58/1.99 cm
  Stopper: coral; gilt-bronze collar
  
  Condition: small glaze flaw on the neck; a miniscule chip to the ear of one scholar waiting on the bank and a small glaze flaw just below the man fishing from the boat; otherwise, kiln condition
  
  Provenance:
  Hugh Moss
  J & J Collection
  Christie's, New York, 30 March 2005, lot 61
  Hugh Moss (HK) Ltd. (2005)
  
  Published:
  Snuff Bottles of the Ch'ing Dynasty, p. 85, no. 115
  JICSBS, Autumn 1989, p. 18, fig. 1
  Moss, Graham, and Tsang 1993, no. 419
  Treasury 6, no. 1352
  
  Exhibited:
  Hugh M. Moss Ltd., London, September 1974
  Hong Kong Museum of Art, October–December 1978
  Christie's New York, 1993
  Empress Place Museum, Singapore, 1994
  Museum für Kunsthandwerk, Frankfurt, 1996 - 1997
  Percival David Foundation of Chinese Art, London, 1997
  Naples Museum of Art, Florida, 2002
  Portland Museum of Art, Oregon, 2002
  National Museum of History, Taipei, 2002
  International Asian Art Fair, Seventh Regiment Armory, New York, 2003
  Poly Art Museum, Beijing, 2003
  
  The artist who used the hao Xinquan is discussed under lot 141, an earlier bottle dated to 1819. As we point out there, we believe that this was the early sobriquet of the famous porcelain carver Chen Guozhi.
  
  This magnificent example is one of his early masterpieces. It is a perfect combination of an elegantly composed subject, superb control of the medium, and a lovely glaze. Here Xinquan has refined his imitation of jadeite so it is less salient in the overall aesthetic equation, allowing the relief detail greater prominence. In lot 141, the eye is at first diverted by the conspicuously dappled and speckled glaze. While this may be more effective in evoking the jadeite that was coming into fashion in the mid-Qing dynasty, the subtler and more even use of variegation here allows the artistic qualities of the porcelain carver to get their well-deserved share of our attention.
  
  Several points about this particular bottle are revealing. The first and most obvious is that it is one of the earliest and one of the few pieces to bear both a reign mark and the signature of the artist, suggesting that it was made for the court and these individualist potters had gained sufficient prominence as artists in their own right by the 1820s for the court to allow them to sign their works, even on an imperial order. Other wares by the early-nineteenth-century porcelain carvers that are covered with an imperial yellow glaze also seem, because of that colour, to have been made for the court, but they are rarely signed.
  
  Another point concerns the use of the enamel as an overall glaze. A tiny flake in the surface colouring reveals that the green colour is not superimposed upon an underlying glaze, as we would expect an enamel to be. Nevertheless, enamelling on the biscuit was a common enough practice in Chinese ceramics. Where the green extends very slightly over the colourless glaze of the inner neck, it changes its texture slightly. This tiny overlap suggests that what we are dealing with in the case of many of the monochrome colours used by the individualist potters is enamel used much as a glaze would have been as an overall colouring.
  
  As intriguing as these two points, however, is the information contained in the relief inscription that the work was done at Jingdezhen (Zhushan being an alternative name for the porcelain metropolis). Given the type of porcelain and range of colours used in this group, this comes as no surprise, but the interesting point is that the artist was 'sojourning' there. This implies that Xinquan was not a native of the area but moved there to produce his works of art. We know Chen Guozhi was not a native of the Jingdezhen area, but came from Anhui province (see Sale 1, lot 81, for details of Chen's life and career), so this may be a further clue that Xinquan and Chen are one and the same.
  
  When dealing with this bottle in Moss, Graham, and Tsang 1993, we allowed for the remote possibility of another identity for Xinquan. We now believe this is very unlikely. He is far more likely to have been Chen Guozhi under an earlier name.
  
  瓷胎模製綠釉渡江圖鼻煙壺
  
  瓷胎上翡翠綠色、無色釉；平唇 ，平斂底，突出弄平的圈足；三面雕山水人物圖；一正面陽刻"時在辛巳季春月，寫於新平珠山客次，心泉氏作"，後鈐陽刻"心泉"篆印及陰刻"氏作"；底書陰刻"大清道光年製" 篆款；壺表除圈足外施翡翠色釉，內頸、內壁施無色釉
  心泉（擬為陳國治），景德鎮，1821年晚春
  高﹕ 6.05 厘米
  口經/唇經： 0.58/1.99 厘米
  蓋： 珊瑚; 鎏金青銅座
  
  狀態敘述：頸有釉裏的小瑕疵，水邊待船的一人的耳朵有微乎其微的缺口，釣魚人下邊有釉裏金瑕疵；此外，出窯狀態
  
  來源﹕
  Hugh Moss
  J & J 珍藏
  紐約佳士得，2005年3月30日，拍賣品號 61
  Hugh Moss (HK) Ltd. (2005)
  
  文獻﹕
  Snuff Bottles of the Ch'ing Dynasty, 頁 85, 編號115
  《國際中國鼻煙壺協會的學術期刊》, 1989年秋期，頁 18, 圖1
  Moss, Graham, and Tsang 1993, 編號419
  Treasury 6, 編號1352
  
  展覽﹕
  Hugh M. Moss Ltd., London, September 1974
  香港藝術館，1978年10月～12月
  Christie's New York, 1993
  Empress Place Museum, Singapore, 1994
  Museum für Kunsthandwerk, Frankfurt, 1996 - 1997
  Percival David Foundation of Chinese Art, London, 1997
  Naples Museum of Art, Florida, 2002
  Portland Museum of Art, Oregon, 2002
  National Museum of History, Taipei, 2002
  International Asian Art Fair, Seventh Regiment Armory, New York, 2003
  Poly Art Museum, Beijing, 2003
  
  說明﹕
  心泉，見本場拍賣會拍賣品號 141。本壺模擬翡翠比那件微妙一點，釉與雕的比重比較平衡量。
  
  本壺帶年款，好像是給宮廷作的，而給宮廷作的鼻煙壺很少帶雕匠的名字。另外一點是，這是以琺瑯料當釉的一個例子。
  
  珠山，景德鎮也。因為本壺是在景德鎮的客邸或者招待所刻的，我們可以推定心泉不是景德鎮人。果然，陳國治是安徽人，所以這是心泉就是陳國治的旁證。參閱 第一場拍賣會，拍賣品號 81。
  
  
  

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Category: Asian Art / Chinese Works of Art

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