Cabinet
Category
Furniture
Date
c. 1730 - c. 1770
Materials
Lacquered wood, copper
Measurements
55 x 59.4 x 37 cm
Place of origin
Guangzhou
Order this imageCollection
Blickling Hall, Norfolk
NT 354232.1
Summary
A lacquer cabinet, probably Guangzhou, China, for the European market, circa 1730–70. With side-hung doors and with a rectangular copper lock plate with rounded corners decorated with foliage, the doors decorated with a landscape with mountains, water, trees and buildings in shades of gold on black surrounded by a band of leaves and flowers in turn surrounded by a diaper border, the sides with copper handles, the inside of the doors decorated with bamboo, the interior of the cabinet with various drawers and compartments, the former decorated with landscape vignettes, the latter mimicking an interior with a depiction of a landscape hanging scroll in the style of Huang Gongwang (1269–1354) flanked by a pair of calligraphic scrolls. For its associated stand see NT 354232.2.
Full description
Compare a Chinese lacquer cabinet in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, inv. no. W.28:1 to 6-1935, with a similar miniature ‘interior’ inside, and dated 1730; and another with inv. no. W.37:1-1940, dated mid-18th century.
Provenance
Bequeathed to the National Trust by the 11th Marquess of Lothian, 1940.