A RHINOCEROS HORN 'MAGNOLIA' LIBATION CUP QING DYNASTY, 18TH CENTURY

the warm honey-coloured material naturalistically carved in the form of a large magnolia flower, borne on gnarled leafy stalks issuing further smaller buds and flowers around the vessel and forming a handle to one side and a short foot to the base, naturalistically carved, pierced wood stand

The magnolia blossom is one of the most popular decorative motifs found on rhinoceros horn carvings. See a cup shaped as a magnolia blossom and decorated with magnolia buds in relief, in the Chester Beatty Library, Dublin, illustrated in Jan Chapman, The Art of Rhinoceros Horn Carvings in China, London, 1999, pl. 211, together with another cup, pl. 378. Compare also a cup from the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco sold in our Los Angeles rooms, 20th October 1974, lot 126; and another sold in our Hong Kong rooms, 20th May 1987, lot 637.