Bitong, Brush Pot Lid

This is the lid of a bitong (brush pot), a scholar's desk item of the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911). The concept of the "four treasures" (inkstone, ink, brush, and paper) of a scholar's study became an appreciated facet of interior design during the Song Dynasty (960-1279). Additional desk items which were appreciated for their function and beauty included brush pots, wrist rests, scroll pots, and desk screens. As this artifact is constructed from bamboo, a plant consisting of stalks that tend to flourish throughout winter, it can be symbolically associated with longevity.

Lacquerware was typically produced in government-sponsored workshops, though this was not always the case. In times of economic prosperity, the commercial workshops of southern China, particularly the southeastern provinces of the Song and Yuan periods (13th-14th century) and the late Ming era (1368-1644), were innovative in their approaches to creating lacquer items. Lacquer items from the Qing palace workshops were, at first, carved by craftsmen capable of overcoming the difficulties of lacquer carving due to their experience carving bamboo and ivory. However, the rapid political and economic decline of the Qing Dynasty following the reign of Qianlong (1735-1796) resulted in the closing down of many palace workshops, and the lacquer items made afterwards were fewer and had diminished in quality.

Cameron, Nigel. The Chinese Scholar's Desk. Hong Kong: FormAsia Books, 2003.

Hutt, Julia. Understanding Far Eastern Art: A Complete Guide to the Arts of China, Japan and Korea - Ceramics, Sculpture, Painting, Prints, Lacquer, Textiles and Metalwork. New York: E.P. Dutton, 1987.

Spurlock Museum of World Cultures. Sculpted Stories: Selected Works from the Fred Freund Collection. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, n.d.

Watt, James C. Y., and Barbara Brennan Ford. East Asian Lacquer: The Florence and Herbert Irving Collection. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1991.