Minneapolis Institute of Art

Square Tray

China

Date

14th century

Medium

Carved red lacquer (<I>tihong<I>)

Department

Asian Art

Institution

Minneapolis Institute of Art

This shallow tray or dish with its dense design featuring two pheasants flying amongst camellias represents a new approach to carved lacquer. The Yuan artisan has used foreshortening and overlapping along with fine incisions to convey texture in the bird's feathers, veins of the leaves and blossoms, and the centers of the flowers, thus creating a stronger sense of three dimensionality than lacquer artists of preceding periods. The outside of the tray is carved in the tixi (marbled) technique with a classic fragrant grass scroll revealing layers of alternating red, black, and cream lacquer where carved through the red surface. The base is lacquered plain black. China, Asia

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