A Chinese bamboo 'bamboo sprig' wrist rest, 18th century, ca...

Hammer

£4,500

A Chinese bamboo 'bamboo sprig' wrist rest, 18th century, carved in high relief with bamboo and incised with a calligraphic inscription and the artisan's seal mark, with golden to caramel brown patina, 17.2cm high

Provenance - Dr J W H Grice (1891-1976) collection.

CONDITION: There a few tiny losses to the tips of carved leaves top left and toward the bottom. The underside has remnants of a black ink inscription with some darker patina and a worn central rib, otherwise in good condition.



Provenance

Dr John William Hawksley Grice (1891-1976) is regarded as a very important collector of carving in Britain; at the time he was collecting, he appears to have been unique among his peers for admiring Qing dynasty carvings. He wrote about 'Chinese Bamboo Carving' in Country Life in 1954, one of the first articles in English on the subject, and at the time he was collecting he appears to have been unique among his peers for admiring late carving. Dr Grice and his wife Kathleen moved to China in 1922 and he worked as a doctor in Tianjin for 30 years. He built his ivory and bamboo collection in China in the decades he spent there before leaving in 1952. He gave a sizeable proportion of his carved bamboo collection to London's Victoria and Albert Museum and donated other ivories and bamboo to the British Museum.