Footnotes

Treasury 5, no. 912


套寶藍料玻璃夔紋或螭紋鼻煙壺
北京，御用玻璃作坊，刻乾隆年款，1750～1790


Reluctant Imperial Kui


Transparent sapphire-blue and translucent milky white glass, the former with one or two small air bubbles; with a flat lip and protruding flat, circular foot; carved as a single overlay with a continuous design of a kui or chi dragon, the foot engraved in regular script Qianlong nian zhi (Made during the Qianlong period)
Imperial glassworks, Beijing, 1750–1790
Height: 4.45 cm
Mouth/lip: 0.7/1.2 cm
Stopper: glass
Condition: minor nibbles to inner lip; one miniscule chip to outer lip—barely visible with the naked eye and not at all obtrusive; minor scratches and abrasions from use, otherwise in workshop condition


Provenance:
Sotheby's, New York, 3 June 1992, lot 380

Published:
Chen Yibing 1994, p. 119, top left
JICSBS, Autumn 1992, p. 23, fig. 2
Treasury 5, no. 912

Commentary:
This is a typical example of the core group of palace glass overlay snuff bottles discussed under Treasury 5, no. 911, where other examples are cited and the group established. This bottle is of small size with a wheel-cut mark, protruding foot without a footrim, contrasting upper neck-rim, and slightly rudimentary carving applied to a delightful and lively subject. The carving skills exhibited in the group range from the almost sublime to designs so sketchily carved as to imply a severe general decline in standards. An intriguing and informative feature of examples at the better end of this range, however, lies in the fact that their shortcomings are more of commitment than ability. In spite of usually being well composed, and laid out with the confidence of a practised carver realizing an artistically conceived design (if, indeed, there was a separate designer - more likely than not with palace arts), the designs are simply not well finished. Most of them give the impression that additional care and effort devoted to surface polishing might have transformed them into masterpieces. This appears to have been a conscious decision on the part of the carvers, for on the rare occasion when a bottle displays impeccable finish, the highest level of lapidary artistry becomes apparent (see for instance Treasury 5, nos. 915 and 916). It seems that these may have been produced as batch orders. This is the result we might expect in situations when the emperor required quantities of snuff bottles as gifts for a particular occasion, time was short and a perfect finish was unimportant. Well formed, of an elegant shape and decorated with a lively and artistic design, the poor level of finish is illustrated by failure to devote the time and effort necessary to recess the protruding foot to form a footrim. The mark is carved straight on the flat surface of the protrusion.
Dragons of various persuasions provide a relatively common theme for the group, this archaistic hybrid being typical. There is another blue and white version, also with a wheel-cut Qianlong reign mark, calling into question whether this was intended as a kui dragon (Sotheby's, Hong Kong, 28 April 1997, lot 27). There the beast is obviously a formalized chi dragon with a bird-like head and four legs, whereas here the legs have become formalized and are only barely identifiable, and the tail has seemingly metamorphosed into what might be taken for lingzhi. The two beasts, however, are obviously related, and this may be intended as a highly formalized chi dragon. Another, in red on white overlay (Friedman 1990, no. 37), brings that obvious chi dragon still closer to the beast here, but remains just identifiable as a chi, suggesting that the same may have been the intention here - or that the distinction had become unimportant, since each represented the ancient culture. The longevity symbolism of these elongated, formalized dragons has been explained under Treasury 5, no. 822.
Regardless of their shortcomings, these little bottles are important landmarks and among the few glass bottles for which an imperial attribution is beyond question, and a palace provenance reasonably assured. They are also among the regularly reign-marked snuff bottles from the palace. There are only about seventy snuff bottles known of the core group, of which seventeen are in the imperial collection, currently divided between Taiwan and Beijing. Another forty or so are of fringe style, directly connected to the group in some way without defining it. For one group of those in the imperial collection, see Chang 1991, nos. 280–291 (all in red on white with the exception of two which are blue on white, and all with Qianlong reign marks, wheel-cut and resembling this one). Others are in Xia 1995, nos. 74–76, where 77 is a fringe-style version.


遲遲不進的御賜夔龍

通體乳白色半透明玻璃 ，套飾寶藍料；平唇、圓形凸足；套料雕通體夔龍紋，或許是螭紋，足刻有切割砂輪陰刻"乾隆年製"無框雙行楷款

御用玻璃作坊，1750～1790
高：4.45 厘米
口經/唇經：0.7/1.2厘米
蓋：玻璃
狀態：口沿有微小缺口，唇外沿亦有一小缺口，肉眼幾乎看不見，因為曾有人享用這件煙壺，壺身有微不足道的磨損，此外是出廠狀態

來源：
蘇富比，紐約，1992年6 月3 日，拍賣品號380
文獻：
陳一兵1994，頁119，上左
《國際中國鼻煙壺協會的學術期刊》Journal of the International Chinese Snuff Bottle Society, 1992年秋期，頁23，圖2
Treasury 5, 編號912

說明：
本壺代表一大批的套料玻璃煙壺，其中的技術水平或高或低。水平低的不是因為圖案不精致而是終飾不夠完整，拋光美好的是如鳳毛麟角的稀少，可它們真是雕琢術的精品。可見，這種煙壺大多數是成批的頒賜品。本壺形式好，套飾有生氣而悅目，只是沒有努力去造出圈足，壺底款識是陰刻在突出底的平面上的。

龍的各種派別為這一組鼻煙壺比較常見的內容，本壺的古風混合物是代表性的。蘇富比香港，1997年4月28 日拍賣品號27也是白色玻璃套藍色料、帶切割砂輪陰刻"乾隆年製"款的，但圖案顯然是呈鳥喙、四足的螭。本壺動物的足是幾乎完全形式化的，尾好像變形為靈芝，不過，兩壺的圖案顯然是同族的，本壺的有石能是形式化的螭。Friedman 1990, 編號37 的白色玻璃套紅料螭紋，的確是螭而有點像本壺的夔；也許本壺就是同一個形式化趨向的終端，但也可能是夔與螭的分別沒甚麼緊要的意義：都是上古文化的象徵。

儘管這些小壺有少許瑕疵，它們還是少數可確定為奉敕作的玻璃煙壺中的一批， 而大約是在宮廷作坊作的。它們經常也具年款。核心組的鼻煙壺只有七十件左右，宮廷收藏十七件，分布於北京與臺北。還有四十幾件可稱為邊緣的，它們屬於這一群而不算是模式標本。張臨生1991，編號280～291（除了兩件白套藍外，都是白套紅，而全部刻有切割砂輪陰刻"乾隆年製"款）就是這類煙壺的一批，還有夏更起1995， 編號74～76，編號77為非模式標本的一例。