Plate 29: Trade, from "A New Book of Chinese Designs"
Etched and published by Matthias Darly British
Artist and publisher George Edwards British
Not on view
Plate number 29 of 'A New Book of Chinese Designs', consisting of a title page, index, and 120 plates, etched and published in 1754 by the British caricaturist, printseller and ornamental engraver Matthew Darly, in collaboration with George Edwards. The book consists of a variety of ornamental and costume designs of Chinese inspiration, some of them copies of the original works (including the title).
This plate represents two Chinese men trading vases. On the left, a man wearing a jacket with flowers, trousers and slippers, and a pointed straw hat, receives a vase from another man, with short robe with flowers, queue and mustache, and bare feet. A basket with vases, some of them containing bundles of leaves, is on the floor, between them. On the left, in a softer shade of color, is another scene, where a man with a straw hat sits by a basket with vases, lifting a vase in his left hand towards another man, on the right, with jacket, trousers, slippers, and queue, who seems to be menacing him with a long whip.
