A rare Imperial yellow-ground 'dragon' silk double-sided hanging


Qianlong The fine brocade delicately woven in counted stitch with gold and polychrome threads on a yellow ground, each side depicting three five-clawed dragons with a sinuous body pursuing a flaming pearl amidst vaporous clouds and flames, above the terrestrial diagram, the lower part enclosing a cluster of ruyi issuing from acanthus leaves between a frieze of pearls and vaporous clouds. 314.5cm (123 6/8in).
|清乾隆 明黃地雲龍趕珠紋直幡Provenance: an English private collection來源： 英國私人收藏This rare silk hanging was probably part of an Imperial curtain hanging, which would have graced the halls throughout the palaces. These type of hangings were decorated with the same colour palette and celestial diagrams as the court robes worn by the emperors and their immediate family members. A similar Imperial curtain hanging from the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, is illustrated by R.Jacobsen, Imperial Silks: Ch'ing Dynasty Textiles in the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, Minneapolis, 2000, pp.956-957. Compare with a related but smaller pair of hangings, Qianlong (each 194.5cm long), which was sold at Christie's Paris, 11 June 2014, lot 278.