I.52
Floating Goddesses

Famille rose enamels on copper, with gold; with a flat lip, concave foot, and flat foot rim; painted with a continuous scene of formalized clouds above formalized waves, with one female deity carrying a stringed instrument (a qin 琴, or perhaps a se 瑟) as she stands on a platform of clouds with her attendant, who holds a leaf fan, and with another deity holding a ruyi sceptre as she floats upon the waves; the foot inscribed in regular script Qianlong nian zhi 乾隆年製 (‘Made in the Qianlong era’); the exterior exposed metal all gilt, the interior covered with turquoise-blue enamel
Palace workshops, Beijing, 1736–1770
Height: 5.1 cm
Mouth/lip: 0.65/1.10 cm
Stopper: coral; silver collar

Provenance:
Sotheby's London, March 29th, 1983, lot 110
Joseph Baruch Silver
Clare Lawrence

Published:
Journal of the International Chinese Snuff Bottle Society, Winter 1984, front cover
Joseph Baruch Silver, Chinese Snuff Bottles from the Collection of Joseph Baruch Silver, in Conjunction with the Exhibition at the Israel Museum, Jerusalem, Winter, 1987 (Jerusalem: Muse’on Yiśra’el, 1987), front cover and p. 45, no. 79
J.B. Silver Collection Poster, 1987
Lawrence, Clare, 1993, Twenty-Five Eminent Chinese of the Ch'ing Period, loose plate.
Lawrence, Clare, 1992, Chinese Snuff Bottle Engagement Diary 1993.

Exhibited: 
Israel Museum, December 12 1987 - May 16 1988
Honolulu Academy of Arts, November 24 1989 - January 7 1990