A biscuit porcelain brushpot, attributed to Chen Guozhi, Seal mark and period of Daoguang | 清道光 傳陳國治製素胎瓷雕「叱石成羊圖」筆筒 《大清道光年製》款

Collection of Sydney Moss (1893–1980).

S. Marchant & Son, London, circa 1960.

Bonhams London, 10th July 2006, lot 186.

Water, Pine and Stone Retreat Collection.

Sotheby's Hong Kong, 4th April 2012, lot 189.

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Sydney Moss (1893–1980) 收藏

馬錢特，倫敦，約1960年

倫敦邦翰斯2006年7月10日，編號186

水松石山房收藏

香港蘇富比2012年4月4日，編號189

Imperial Chinese Porcelain, Ceramics and works of Art, Marchant, London, 2013, cat. no. 45.

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《Imperial Chinese Porcelain, Ceramics and Works of Art》，馬錢特，倫敦，2013年，編號45

The inscription on the present brushpot reads and may be translated as follows:

「時在仲夏寫於昌，將珠山客次書為。」──叱石成羊圖

Written in the mid-Summer while being a guest at Changjiang Zhushan,

inscribed for the painting titled 'Turning the Stones into Goats by Shouting'.

Zhushan is located in Jingdezhen, site of the Imperial kilns in Jiangxi province. The painting 'Chi shi cheng yang tu' takes inspiration from the Daoist story included in Ge Hong's (284-363) Shenxian zhuan (Biography of Immortals) of the Jin dynasty (265-420). It is a tale of a young shepherd boy called Huang Chuping, a native of Danxi, Jinhua, who at age fifteen mysteriously disappeared while herding a flock of sheep. His elder brother, Huang Chuqi, searched everywhere for him but without success. Forty years later, by chance Chuqi met a Daoist priest at a market who told him that there is a shepherd in Jinhua Mountain. This shepherd turned out to be his long-lost brother Chuping. The two brothers were finally reunited, and Chuping explained that he followed an immortal and thereby gained immortality himself. Chuqi asked about the whereabouts of his herd, upon which his brother told him that they were on the hillside in front of a cave. Chuqi went to the cave but could only see white rocks amongst the shrubs and bushes. However, when Chuping suddenly shouted all the white rocks turned into sheep. This confirmed to Chuqi that his brother had indeed turned into a Daoist immortal. The two are known as Er Huang Jun - the two Huang immortals. The phrase 'chi shi cheng yang' (turning the stones into goats by shouting) came to be used as an idiom for describing miraculous happenings.

The present brushpot belongs to a small group of vessels attributed to the work of Chen Guozhi, ceramic artist at Jingdezhen during the early nineteenth century. Chen individually crafted and signed carved porcelains, often imitating wood, ivory and bamboo carvings. During the first half of the nineteenth century the distinction between artists and craftsmen began to dissolve, encouraging fine craftsmen like Chen to assume artistic pretences of identification and dating to match their undoubted skills at potting and carving. While this brushpot is unsigned, the inscription suggests that it is by Chen's hand. See a snuff bottle, in the James and Julie Li collection, illustrated in Hugh Moss, Victor Graham and Ka Bo Tsang, The Art of the Chinese Snuff Bottle: The J & J Collection, New York, 1993, pl. 251, where the style of writing is very similar to that on this piece, and in both the artist is recorded sojourning at Zhushan.

Other works signed by Chen include a white-glazed biscuit brushpot depicting figures and water buffalo in a landscape illustrated in Literati Works of Art, London, 1999, cat. no. 95; another large brushpot decorated with a mountainous landscape scene with figures, from the collection of Mary and George Bloch offered in these rooms, 23rd October 2005, lot 28; a light turquoise-glazed vessel, published in John Ayers, Chinese Ceramics in the Baur Collection, vol. 2, Geneva, 1999, pl. 340; and a small box and cover illustrated In Scholar's Taste, London, 1983, pl. 103.