The vertical composition of this boulder, which has been dexterously carved in varying levels of relief, cleverly creates a sense of recession and vast space while utilizing the maximum amount of the precious material. In subject it captures an idealized landscape in miniature form, ingeniously incorporating into the design the natural features of the stone. The visual vocabulary on which these miniature landscapes combined many features of the natural world. Moreover, the figures, animals and plants depicted pertained to a system of design sustained by a complex concept of the universe and its auspicious phenomena (see Jessica Rawson, ‘The Auspicious Universe’, China. The Three Emperors 1662-1795, London, 2005, pp 358-361).

Following the Qianlong Emperor's conquest of the northwestern territories, large reserves of jade became available in the territories of Khotan and Yarkand and were sent as tribute to the court. With this sudden abundance of high-quality jade, three-dimensional miniature jade landscapes were first produced in various shapes and sizes. The Qianlong Emperor advocated that jade mountains and carved panels should carry the spirit of paintings by famous past masters. It is recorded that a number of classical paintings from the emperor's own collection were ordered to be reproduced in jade, such as the celebrated painting Travellers in the Mountains, by the eminent Five Dynasties painter Guan Tong (907-960). 

Comparable carvings of mountains inhabited by immortals include one in the National Palace Museum, Taipei, included in the Museum’s exhibition The Refined Taste of the Emperor: Special Exhibition of Archaic and Pictorial Jades of the Ch’ing Court, Taipei, 1997, cat. no. 40; one in the Palace Museum, Beijing, illustrated in The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum. Jadeware (III), Hong Kong, 1995, pl. 73; one sold in our Paris rooms, 12th December 2013, lot 100; and a fourth example sold at Christie’s Hong Kong, 27th November 2007, lot 1510.

本山子構圖精妙，良材盡用，玉匠以浮雕深淺刻劃山石層次，利用原材特質，營造豐富畫面。案頭玉雕，盡收山水意境，自然風景各態，展現於紋飾之上，人物、動物、植物等佈局符合吉祥意象，亦切合傳統中式的宇宙觀（參考傑西卡?羅森，〈The Auspicious Universe〉，《China. The Three Emperors 1662-1795》，倫敦，2005年，頁358-361）。

乾隆西征後，和闐、莎車等地所產良玉朝貢不斷。玉材供應量突然大增，藝匠開始雕刻立體玉山，刻劃自然山水景色，形狀、尺寸各異。乾隆帝主張插屏及山子等玉雕須帶歷代名家畫意。據載，高宗曾命工匠照其御藏古畫雕玉，其中包括五代山水大家關仝所作《關山行旅圖》等。

可比較相類玉山數例，如台北國立故宮博物院收藏一例，雕聽泉圖，曾展於《宮廷之雅：清代仿古及畫意玉器特展圖錄》，故宮博物院，台北，1997年，編號40；北京故宮博物院收藏一例，圖載於《故宮博物院藏文物珍品全集?玉器（下）》，香港，1995 年，圖版73；再比一例，售於巴黎蘇富比2013年12月12日，編號100；尚有一例，售於香港佳士得2007年11月27日，編號1510。