18TH-19TH CENTURY

The present textile is remarkable for its exceptional quality, massive size, and composition which combines embroidery with a counted stitch border. The embroidery on this panel is particularly fine, with details picked out in fine silk floss threads. All of the facial features of the figures from their emotive eyebrows, to their finely delineated hair, to the details on their patterned robes, are embroidered with precision and great skill.

The present scene can be identified as Gathering at the Turquoise Pond (yao chi) and is nearly identical to that on an embroidered panel, dated 17th-18th century, sold at Christie’s New York, 22 March 2007, lot 451. See the previous lot for a discussion of this scene.