A PARCEL-GILT BRONZE INCENSE BURNER BY HU WENMING, MING DYNASTY, 17TH CENTURY

of archaistic gui form, the compressed globular body supporting on a splayed foot, the sides flanked by a pair of mythical beast handles, the two main sides each with an identical design of a taotie mask, below a waisted neck decorated with two pairs of stylised phoenix, the foot with a leafy floral scroll band, the detail all cast and gilt against a diapered ground, the base with a rectangular gilt panel engraved with a seal mark reading Yunjian Hu Wenming zhi ('made by Hu Wenming of Yunjian')

A private European collection.

Hu Wenming from Songjiang, Jiangsu province, was one of the most accomplished master metalworkers of the late Ming period, who specialised in the production of gilt metal vessels for the scholar's desk. For another bronze incense burner of gui form by Hu Wenming, engraved with similar seal mark on the base, see the example from the Water, Pine and Stone Retreat collection, sold in these rooms, 8th April 2014, lot 240.