Beautiful and Mysterious

 LARGE PAINTED LACQUER COFFER

18^th Century

76” x 22” x 37”H

One of the great joys in the Chinese antique furniture business is finding a piece that is a real puzzler. Michael, my husband and business partner, purchased it in a furniture market in Southern China a number of years ago.  This particular coffer has an unusual trapezoid shape that is unfamiliar in Chinese furniture.  Its black lacquered surface is decorated with groups of bird and flower painting with beautiful rendering of brush work in pastel tones that seem to have a luminous quality.  Still life studies of flowers and fruits are grouped with antique objects and they all share the auspicious symbol of wealth and prosperity.  The style of the painting is neither Chinese nor Japanese.  The still life grouping of objects is more often seen on painted Korean screens.  The whole presentation of the coffer shows a painted art object that is formal, well organized, and beautifully rendered, but they do not share the mannerisms that are associated with Chinese, Japanese nor Koreans.  What then, are the elements that so persuasive? Take the birds on the flowering branches for instance.  This is a subject matter found in all three cultures.  Why do I look at them and think European Botanical Print?  My formal training in the history of Chinese and Japanese painting led me to the deduction that the entire schematic structure, despite its beauty, does not adhere to the Chinese painting tradition.  On the other hand, it harks of elegance and refinement that are associated with Japanese painting, but the composition is too complex.  When in doubt, I try the third alternative – Korean, but none of the elements applied here.

So the coffer with the trapezoid shape continued to delude us until we happened upon a similar piece in my cousin’s apartment in New York City.  Her coffer was in the same style and shape as ours.  According to the information which was based on the research of a well esteemed Chinese art historian, these painted coffers were specially made in the Ryuku Islands for a rich Chinese merchant who imported them to the Peking (Beijing) market in the 18 century.  We know about the Ryuku Islands by way of Okinawa.  It is an island chain that extends from the southern Japanese island of Kyushu to the northern tip of Taiwan Island.  In ancient times, it was an independent kingdom.  The Chinese and Japanese fought over its sovereignty from the 14 to the 19 century.  Under Japanese sovereignty, many Koreans came to work on the islands.  They brought with them their artistic tradition and technique that were neither Chinese nor Japanese but had a unique quality all their own. By the 18 century, European bird and flower painting would have arrived in Japan in the form of botanical prints.  Could it be plausible that the Ryuku artists learned the western technique and applied them here? That would offer an explanation why the unusual rendering of the birds and flowers deviate so far from Asian traditions, yet the cumulative effect is a reflection of the art of all three cultures.

The knowledge places the coffer in a different perspective.  We have learned that this was a special import, therefore highly treasured; that it was rare, for few were made.  Long ago it graced the environment of a wealthy home, and now in a formal room, it can resume its importance as a focal point once more.