Kolekcja | 24.09.2015 Lui Hai – the Taoist god of welfare and good fortune – is up to this day regarded as an amulet bringing luck in business. The deity is always shown together with his friend and companion – a three-legged toad; another attribute is a chain of gold coins.
The figurine is carved in a root and emerges from the irregular and twisted surface in an almost natural and organic way. The understatement characteristic for such carvings is to be a metaphor of the inconstancy and changeability of life. The Wilanów collections include a whole set of similar carvings depicting Chinese immortals and deities; in Europe they were collected as exotic curiosities.
According to Chinese tradition these are so-called objects from a scholar’s table, which included also wine cups, containers for paintbrushes and water, stones for powdering India ink, assorted boxes, seals and small carvings and figurines. They also fulfilled practical functions, and their beauty, symbolic and unusual nature were to incline poets and scholars towards contemplation and reflection.
Anna Ekielska-Mardal