J.J. Lally & Co., Oriental Art / New York City, New York
MenuPast Exhibition
Arts of Ancient China
March 27 - April 12, 2006
23.
A PAIR OF LACQUERED WOOD CUPS WITH WINGED HANDLES
Eastern Zhou Dynasty, 4th-3rd Century B.C.
of elongated oval form, each lacquered in orangey-red on the interior, with a wide border of wing-and-scroll motifs in a complex repeating pattern lacquered in red on a dark brown ground around the inner mouth-rim and with a narrower rendition of the same border around the outer mouth-rim continuing along the flat outer edges of the flaring wing-shaped handles which are decorated on top with detached scroll motifs, and with a running deer on one handle, the other handle with a long-tailed bird with wings displayed, the underside of both cups covered with dark brown lacquer, the edge of the oval platform base with a narrow red border, the wooden substrata of the cups now desiccated and the surface showing shallow wrinkles, the lacquer well preserved throughout.
Lengths 7 inches and 71⁄4 inches (17.8 cm and 18.4 cm)
Lacquer ‘ear-cups’ of this distinctive form with wing-shaped handles were produced only during the late Zhou in the state of Chu.
Compare the slightly smaller lacquered wood cup with winged handles of very similar form, decorated with a similar wing-and-scroll pattern described by the author as “transmitted geometric twin-phoenixes”, which was excavated from a Chu state tomb at Yutaishan, Jiangling, Hubei, and is now in the Hubei Provincial Museum, published by Teng in the monograph entitled Chu Qigi Yanjiu (Research on Chu Lacquerware), Hong Kong, 1991, p.12, col. pl. 1.
東周 彩繪漆耳盃一對 長 17.8 厘米 及 18.4 厘米
