Seal-paste box with lid, carved nephrite jade, China, Ming dynasty, 1500-1600

Seal-paste jade box, cylindrical shape with a deep lid, carved with twelve lychee fruits with seven different diaper patterns on them.

Bought from Sydney Moss

From Register: Craig Clunas 31-10-1988

A very similarly proportioned and decorated box light green jade box from a private collection in Hong Kong is illustrated in James C.Y. Watt, Chinese Jades from Han to Ch'ing, New York, 1980, no. 115. This example has a variety of different diapers on the fruit, and employs double lines for the veining of hate leaves. The two boxes are unlikely to be products of the same workshop.

A number of carved red lacquer boxes of similar proportions and decoration are also recorded. For examples see Jan Wirgin, 'Some Chinese Carved Lacquer of the Yuan and Ming Periods', BMFEA, 44, 1972, pp. 93-114, pls. 21-22; Sir Harry Garner, Chinese Lacquer, London, 1979, p. 128; and Gugong qiqi tezhan mulu, Taipei, 1981, no. 25.

The depiction of lychee as a subject is also seen on a number of carved red lacquer boxes of varying proportions. See Fritz Low-Beer, 'Chinese Lacquer of the Early 15th Century', BMFEA. 22, 1950, pp. 145-167, pl. 22.
Wirgin, op. cit., pl. 20
Important Chinese Lacquer, Ceramics and Works of Art. Christie's. London, 14 Dec 1983, lot 34
Wang Shixiang, Gugong bowuyuan zang diaoqi, Beijing, 1985, no. 122.
The Hundred Flowers. Botanical Motifs in Chinese Art, San Francisco: Asian Art Museum, 1985, no. 26.

A unique ivory box with comparable lychee decoration is in the Palace Museum, Beijing. See Zhongguo meishu quanji. Gongyi meishu bian Il. Zhu mu ya jiao qi. Beijing, 1987, no. 88
Interpretation: For the role of jade in the 16th century see Craig Clunas, 'Jade Carvers and their Customers in Ming China', TOCS, 50.

The dating of the object is based on the analogy with the more securely dated sequence of carved red lacquer. This analogy is strengthened by a jade box dated 1561 (See James C.Y. Watt, Chinese Jades from Han to Ch'ing, New York, 1980, no. 114 and signed Lu Zigang, which connects similarly with the lacquer sequence at the right date.

The lychee, lizhi, has latterly had symbolic associations with the marriage bed and with the birth of sons. See The Hundred Flowers, no. 26; Wolfram Eberhard, A Dictionary of Chinese Symbols, London, 1986, p. 163; and Regina Krahl, 'Plant motigs of Chinese Porcelain Part II', Orientations, June 1987, 24-37 (p. 29).

Although this symbolic meaning has not yet been substantiated for the Ming period, the cataloguer's hypothesis is that lychee decoration was restricted to objects for women's use and possession. This box would thus have been used for the storage of female cosmetics or incense for use in the women's quarters of the house.

Note that the vendor described it on the sale document as a seal paste box, implicitly absorbing the object to the high status, high commerical value discourse of 'scholar's taste'. The systematic but unconscious effacing of the possibility of a distinctive culture of Chinese women is standard in the art market in Chinese goods at the present time.

Other hand-written comments:
See Varity Wilson, 'Identifying Women's Things in the T.T. Tsui Galler'y, Orientations, July 1991, photo p. 39.

See Rose Kerr (ed.), T.T. Tsui Gallery of Chinese Art and Design, London: V&A Publications, 1991, photo p. 143.

A very similar box was lot 1008 in Fine Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art. Jadeite Jewellry, Jade Carvings and Snuff Bottles, Christie's Swire, Hong Kong, 22-23 March 1993.

This small box was a container of seal paste, a red paste with which an artist or collector affix his seal on a painting or other works of art on paper.

FE.154-1988