Lot 3512. A blue and white brush pot, Chongzhen period, circa 1640. Estimate $30,000 – $40,000. Price realised USD 75,000. Photo Christie’s Image Ltd 2015
The brushpot, of slender cylindrical form, is decorated on the exterior with a scene from The Romance of the Three Kingdoms depicting the general Lu Xun on horseback, enveloped by billowing clouds, meeting with the scholar Huang Chengyan beneath a willow tree, all between finely incised scroll borders. The flat base is unglazed. 6 ½ in. (16.5 cm.) high
Provenance: Ralph M. Chait Galleries, New York, 1989.
Collection of Julia and John Curtis.
Literature: Julia B. Curtis, Chinese Porcelains of the Seventeenth Century: Landscapes, Scholars’ Motifs and Narratives, New York, 1995, pp. 102-103, no. 34
Exhibited: China Institute Gallery, New York, Chinese Porcelains of the Seventeenth Century: Landscapes, Scholars’ Motifs and Narratives, 22 April – 5 August 1995.
Notes: Lu Xun was a general and politician in the state of Eastern Wu. After the Battle of Xiaoting, he found himself lost in Zhuge Liang’s Stone Sentinel Maze, which was an arrangement of rocks and boulders conjured up by Zhuge Liang based on the concept of the ancient bagua. In the scene on this brush pot Lu Xun is shown meeting the scholar Huang Chengyan, who leads him out of the maze. Huang Chengyan had a daughter, Huang Yueying, who later married Zhuge Liang.
CHRISTIE’S. AN ERA OF INSPIRATION: 17TH-CENTURY CHINESE PORCELAINS FROM THE COLLECTION OF JULIA AND JOHN CURTIS, 16 March 2015,New York, Rockefeller Plaza
