China, Qianlong period (1736-1795) Finely carved as a rocky mountainous landscape with a flat base, the front deeply carved and pierced with a scene depicting three sages standing above a grotto, flanked by pine trees, below a young servant carrying a tray, the top carved with a deep crevice with a bridge and a temple.
Dimensions Measurement: 9 x 15 x 8 In. / 22.8 x 38 x 20.3 cm
Provenance Property from the Collection of Jameson J. Wood.
Notes Note: The jade boulder, carved in the form of three-dimensional landscapes, was first seen during the Qianlong reign. According to Alfreda Murck in Evelyn S. Rawski and Jessica Rawson (editors), China. The Three Emperors, 1662-1795, London, 2005, the Qianlong era experienced increased fresh resources of jade 'as a result of the expansion of the Qing empire into central Asia and imports from border regions'. The boulders were carved at a workshop in Yangzhou, Jiangsu province. (p. 463) The ability to create visual depth, thus bringing the figures further into the landscape, was a skill mastered by Qianlong period jade carvers. Perhaps the most heralded of this genre is the extremely large example depicting 'The Nine Elders of Huichang' in The Palace Museum, Beijing, illustrated in Rawski and Rawson (op.cit.), pl. 267. Inscribed with a Qianlong poem, with seals of the emperor, this majestic work embodies the apogee of jade mountain carvings. In fact, it was considered superior to ink painting, the original inspiration for this genre: in the inscription by the emperor, he notes that the permanence of stone trumps ink on paper. Another example, one of the largest and most elaborate boulders of this type, is the carving dated in accordance with 1784 in the T. B. Walker Collection at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, illustrated in Robert D. Jacobsen, The Asian Galleries, Minneapolis, 1982, pp. 60-61.