Antique Lacquer and Gilt Straits Chinese Shrine Cabinet, China (3986)

Description

Straits Chinese (Peranakan Chinese) refers to mixed-blood Chinese living in former British settlements in Penang, Malacca, Singapore, Indonesia and Malaysia whose forefathers were early Chinese traders, sailors and laborers. Many Chinese traders, laborers, and merchants remained in Southeast Asia during monsoon season before returning married local women living a two-family life. This wealthy population favored Chinese vernacular lacquer coated furniture with ostentatious show of wealth with auspicious symbols.

Chinese Straits Shrine cabinet were used by Straits Chinese in Southeast Asia to house ancestor tablets on a family altar. They were very elaborate affairs, covered in black lacquer with red and gold highlights with motifs like phoenixes, flowers, and vases, atop rococo-style scrolling feet. 

The doors featured intricately carved and gilded openwork panels and opened up to an equally ornate interior with red lacquer, gilt fringe, and a backdrop with Chinese scenes. This was a show of status and piety, designed to be a dignified display for honoring ancestral spirits.

This shrine was made in Guangdong for the Southeast Asia market. It rests on a low pedestal with curving gilt lines and florals. Each hinged door has three carved openwork panels: top and bottom horizontal with florals centered with a lotus pod filled with seeds expressing a wish for many sons and a tall center one with a phoenix flanked by peonies. The phoenix was a popular Southeast Asian Chinese symbol as one of the four divine animals.  A pair with outstretched wings represents harmony between a husband and wife and a wish many sons. When the phoenix “king of birds” is paired with peonies, the “king of flowers,” it symbolizes harmony, blessings, good fortune, and prosperity.

The inside wall has a painted outline of a gilt table holding a Chinese screen. Two scholars admire a natural setting of mountains, water and vegetation and a scholar in his studio contemplates scholars objects. Knapp (p. 99) observes that pairs of similar ancestral shrine cabinets were placed on home altar tables holding two generations of spirit tablets.

Covered with marriage and blessings symbols, it probably was a gift for newlyweds to be used later as an ancestral shrine. It remains in the category of great wedding gifts. It is in very good condition despite expected signs of age and use: minor chips and wood losses, cracks, lacquer losses, and dings; a crack on the vertical length of the painting on the rear wall.

Sources

Maria Khoo Joseph, “Auspicious Designs: Batik for Peranakan Altars,” Be Muse, Volume 7, Issue 3 – Jul to Sep 2014

Ronald Knapp, The Peranakan Chinese Home: Art and Culture in Daily Life, Singapore, Tuttle Press, Singapore, 2017.