Bonhams. Fine Chinese Art, London, 5 Nov 2020.
A rare eight-leaf double-sided 'Coromandel' 'boys at play' lacquer screen, Kangxi period (1662-1722)
Lot 96. A rare eight-leaf double-sided 'Coromandel' 'boys at play' lacquer screen, Kangxi period (1662-1722). Each leaf 230cm (90 1/2in) high x 42cm (16 1/2in) wide. Estimate £ 20,000-30,000. Sold for £ 68,812 (€ 76,658). Courtesy Bonhams.
Exquisitely decorated on the front with a detailed scene of fifty boys at play within a garden setting, each engaged in various leisurely activities such as waving dragon banners, riding a hobby-horse, playing with dogs or playing kickball, all framed by a border of various floral sprays and the 'Hundred Antiques', the reverse with numerous cartouches containing typical subjects of literati painting such as birds and flowers and mountainous landscapes with figures.
Provenance: a distinguished English private collection, acquired prior to the 1950s, and thence by descent.
Note: Although the term 'Coromandel', referring to a section of the east coast of India, implies that these screens were typically made for the export market (European traders misunderstood the origin of these screens), the present lot was almost certainly made for the domestic market in China. The motif of 'One hundred boys' or 'boys at play' is a popular motif in Chinese art and encapsulates the good Confucian wish for numerous descendants to continue worshipping the ancestors.
The 'one hundred boys' motif is perhaps based on the legend of King Wen of Zhou who supposedly fathered 99 sons from his 24 wives, and adopted an orphan boy to accomplish 100. The figure of 100 should not be taken literally, but indicates a large number. The motif was already found on stone carvings of the Han dynasty and in paintings of the Jin (265-420) and Tang (618-906) dynasties. It became popular in the Song dynasty with painters such as Su Hanchen (1127-1189) and Li Song (1166-1243) but it was most widely seen in the Ming and Qing periods, notably on ceramics, textiles or lacquer. Compare for example, the painting of children on a blue and white jar, Jiajing six-character mark and of the period, illustrated in The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum: Blue and White Porcelain with Underglaze Red (II), Hong Kong, 2000, no.101. The treatment of the boys in the present lot owes much to the Ming style of depicting boys, and would indicate a late 17th century date.
Compare with two twelve-leaf coromandel screens, Kangxi, with similar motifs of 'boys at play' illustrated by W.De Kesel and G.Dhont, Coromandel Lacquer Screens, Ghent, 2002, pp.54, 56-57.