Juliette Hammer
Sale Coordinator
Lot 14
A BAMBOO BUDDHIST LION AND CUB CARVING 18th century
14 May 2025, 10:00 BST
London, New Bond Street£2,000 - £3,000
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Chen Xie
Specialist
Edward Luper
Specialist, Chinese Works of Art
Lazarus Halstead
Head of Chinese and Asian Art, London
A BAMBOO BUDDHIST LION AND CUB CARVING
18th century
Expertly carved in the form of a large recumbent Buddhist lion, detailed with open mouth, bulbous black eyes and finely curled manes, holding a brocade ball in its forepaws and turning to the right toward a cub resting on her back, the underside hollowed out, the bamboo of warm cocoa-brown tone.
12cm (4 3/4in) wide.
Expertly carved in the form of a large recumbent Buddhist lion, detailed with open mouth, bulbous black eyes and finely curled manes, holding a brocade ball in its forepaws and turning to the right toward a cub resting on her back, the underside hollowed out, the bamboo of warm cocoa-brown tone.
12cm (4 3/4in) wide.
Footnotes
十八世紀 竹雕太師少師擺件
The representation of a larger and a smaller Buddhist lion, dashi xiaoshi (大獅小獅), forms the pun taishi shaoshi (太師少師), which can be understood as an auspicious wish for 'May you and your descendant achieve high rank.' Compare with a similar bamboo carving of a Buddhist lion playing with a brocade ball and cub, by Shi Qiji, 18th/early 19th century, illustrated by Ip Yee and L.C.S.Tam, Chinese Bamboo Carving, vol.I, Hong Kong, 1978, p.100 and pp.346-347. Another example, 17th century, is illustrated by Sydney L.Moss Ltd., The Literati Mode: Chinese Scholar Paintings, Calligraphy and Desk Objects, London, 1986, p.168, no.49. Another bamboo carving of a lion and ball, early Qing dynasty, in the Shanghai Museum, is illustrated in Literati Spirit: Art of Chinese Bamboo Carving, Shanghai, 2012, p.64, no.21. See also a very similar carving, Qing dynasty, illustrated in Ming and Qing Chinese Arts from the C.P.Lin, Hong Kong, 2014, p.313, no.188.
See a similar bamboo Buddhist lioness and cubs carving, 17th century, which was sold at Bonhams Hong Kong, 27 May 2021, lot 56.