A GOOD CHINESE CINNABAR LACQUER 'BAJIXIANG' BOX AND COVER

18TH CENTURY

With an elongated hexalobed body, carved to the cover with a scene of two scholars playing weiqi beneath a pine tree in a rocky landscape, a further figure stands between them watching the game as a young attendant brings over a dish of peaches, the sides carved with cartouches enclosing sprays of magnolia, mallow, finger citron, peony and other branches, with the Eight Auspicious Buddhist Emblems dividing the panels, all reserved on a ground of finely incised diaper, with black lacquer to the interior and base, the base with a paper label for Spink & Son Ltd, 17.2cm. (2)

Cf. Christie's Hong Kong, 29th April 2002, lot 576 for a similarly shaped Qianlong box also carved with the Eight Auspicious Buddhist Emblems surrounding a central panel enclosing figures; see also Sotheby's London, 15th May 2019, lot 80 for a comparable elongated quatrelobed box from the Qianlong period also decorated with a figural scene surrounded by the Bajixiang and similar floral panels.