A spinach-green jade 'landscape' brushpot, Qing dynasty, Qianlong period

Spink & Son Ltd., London, 6th May 1968.

Collection of Harold Wesley Hall (1888-1974), label no. 18, and thence by descent.

This beautifully carved spinach-green jade brush pot exemplifies the 'pictorial jades', where the jade workshop treats the surface of the material like a scroll. To achieve the high-relief effects, the jade must be carved deeply and intricately, using various depths and openwork. Creating a jade brush pot like this necessitates a combination of the craftsman's exceptional skills and a sufficient supply of large-sized jade material.

It is generally believed that only after the conquest of the Western territories of the empire (xiyu) in 1759, the Qing imperial court gained continuous access to jade from Khotan (Hetian) in modern-day Xinjiang. From then on, a larger quantity of jade ware was produced under the Qing imperial commission. Besides white jade, the Qianlong emperor also favoured jade of a deep spinach-green colour. In addition to commissioning numerous works of art, including imperial seals and brush pots in ‘spinach jade’ (lü yu) for his palaces, the emperor also penned several imperial poems expressing his appreciation for this material.

This brush pot features a Daoist figure scene of three elderly figures walking in the mountains toward a distant pavilion, one holding herbs of immortality, one leaning on a staff, under a group of pine trees. In the far distance, a boy is depicted holding a peach, together with a pair of deer. A similar auspicious theme can be seen on a spinach-green jade table screen inscribed with an imperial poem, which helps us to identify the trio as the Star Gods of Fu (fortune), Lu (prosperity), and Shou (longevity), see Robert Kleiner, Chinese Jades from the Collection of Alan and Simone Hartman, 1996, pl. 124.

Figures in a landscape are a common theme on imperial spinach-green jade brush pots. Three comparable examples from the National Palace Museum, Taipei, are exhibited in Gongting zhi ya, Qingdai fanggu ji huayi yuqi tezhan tulu / The Refined Taste of the Emperor: Special Exhibition of Archaic and Pictorial Jade of the Ch'ing Court , Taipei, 1997, cat. no. 58; no. 55 of smaller size, also without feet; and cat. no. 56 of slightly larger size with feet; compare also three spinach-green jade examples in the Palace Museum, Beijing, illustrated in Gugong Bowuyuan cang wenwu zhenpin quanji, Yuqi/ The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum, Jadeware (III), Hong Kong, 1995, pls 168-170.

Another related brush pot depicting a landscape scene with figures is illustrated in Robert Kleiner, Chinese Jades from the Collections of Alan and Simone Hartman, Hong Kong, 1996, pl. 113, and one is published in The Woolf Collection of Chinese Jade, London, 2013, cat. no. 45; compare also a piece depicting a group of immortals within a landscape, from the collection of Alfred Morrison, Fonthill House, sold at Christie's London, 9th July 1980, lot 105, and again sold in our New York rooms, 10th September 2019, lot 15, from the collection of Florence and Herbert Irving.