The
Art of Snuff Bottles
A popular story tells how the art of painting snuff bottles
originated. In the Qing Dynasty, an official stopped on his way
to a small temple for a rest. When he took out his crystal
snuff bottle to take a sniff, he found it was already empty. He
then scraped off a little powder that had stuck on the interior
wall of the bottle by means of a slender bamboo stick, thus leaving
lines on the inside, visible through he transparent wall. A
young monk saw him at this and hit upon the idea of making pictures
inside the bottle. Thus, a new art form was born.
 Whether this story is truth or fiction, interior painting
in snuff bottles was born and developed
in China and is unique to the country.
The "painting brush" of the snuff bottle artist
today is not very different from what the official in the story
used at the beginning. It is a slender bamboo stick, not much thicker
but much longer than a match. The tip is shaped like a fine-pointed
hook. Dipped in colored ink and thrust inside the bottle, the hooked
tip is used to paint on the interior surfaces of the walls, following
the will of the painter.
The art became perfected and flourished toward the end of
the Qing Dynasty at the turn of the century. Curio dealers began
to offer good prices to collect them.
Snuff bottles are small, generally no more than 6-7 centimeters
high and 4-5 centimeters wide, yet the accomplished artist can produce,
on the limited space of the internal surfaces, any subject running
the whole gamut of traditional Chinese painting - human portraits,
landscapes, flowers and birds and calligraphy. It is said that each
artist puts a his or her soul inside one single bottle!
- by Frank Jang, Asian
art and furniture historian and importer
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