AN IMPERIAL GILT-BRONZE ‘THREE FRIENDS’ WRISTREST

QING DYNASTY, 18TH CENTURY

LENGTH: 22.5CM

WEIGHT: 605G

Masterfully cast in the form of a scaled pine tree trunk with a gnarled branch of clustered pine needles wrapping around the upper left edge, the wristrest is further adorned by leafy bamboo and flowering prunus near the bottom forming the ‘Three Friends of Winter’, all tied loosely with a sash just below the waist.

The ‘Three Friends of Winter’ is represented by the pine, the prunus and bamboo – three plants resilient to the harsh winter season.

SIMILAR EXAMPLES

A closely related bamboo wristrest of nearly identical form and size is published in Maria Kiang Chinese Art, 2019, Catalogue No. 10. Wristrests of similar form but rendered in different media are known, see a spinach-green jade example from the Palace Museum, Beijing, illustrated in Zhongguo Wenfang Sibao Quanji Volume 4: Scholar’s Objects 中國文房四寶全集 4: 文房清供, Beijing, 2008, p. 172, Catalogue No. 216.

The ribbon-tied sash was a motif probably inspired from sophisticated Japanese packaging customs – which had reputedly fascinated both the Yongzheng and Qianlong emperors. Such decorative motif was popular among the imperial workshops, where a range of examples rendered in porcelain, lacquer, glass and enamelled metalwork were known. A porcelain example of the cloth-bound motif from the Beijing Palace Museum collection is illustrated in Imperial Packing Art of the Qing Dynasty, Beijing, 2000, pp. 160-161, Catalogue No .66.

清十八世紀      銅鎏金歲寒三友臂擱