2006: Two album sheets from the Qing period (1644-1911) and Landscape. Qian Du (1763-1844)

Landscape. Fang Cong (to 1749-1790)

Ink on paper | H: 26 cm; L: 32,8 cm | Dated 1770

MC 2006-79. Old Reubi collection. Gift of Mrs. Lotus Mahé with the Mont Blanc Foundation

The first, by Fang Cong, an active court painter during the Qianlong era, suggests the importance given to a certain conception of “literate” painting in the milieu of the imperial academy at that time. This painting is closely related in style to one of the pages of a Fang Cong album kept at the Guimet museum (Jacques Giès, Marie-Catherine Rey (ed.): The very rich hours of the Chinese court, masterpieces of Qing imperial painting (1662-1796), 2006 NMR, p.138, cat. 53 [top]). The poem signed and dated 1770 accompanying the painting has been translated by François Reubi (The brush of the literati, paintings of the François Reubi collection, Baur Collections, No. 56, Fall-Winter 1993, p.34).

Ink on paper | H: 15,3 cm; L: 19,8 cm

MC2006-80. Old Reubi collection. Gift of Mrs. Lotus Mahé with the Mont Blanc Foundation

The second album sheet, signed Qian Du (1763-1844), is the work of an undoubtedly more original creator, able to revisit the work of the masters of the Wu school, while introducing colorful harmonies and perspective shortcuts which belong only to him. Here Qian Du is distinguished by the extreme thoroughness of the brushwork that matches the modesty of the format. The impression that emerges from the landscape is nonetheless as monumental as in larger works such as the horizontal scroll by Qian Du given by Jean-Pierre Dubosc to the Cleveland Museum (Eight Dynasties of Chinese Painting, The Collection of Nelson Atkins Museum, Kansas City and the Cleveland Museum of Art, 1980, p.381). The work signed "Shumei", nickname (hao) of Qian Du, bears the inscription "In the style of Juzi Zhen, Shumei", it is accompanied by a seal in red letters: "Du".