Magpie / Sparrows

XU BEIHONG (1895-1953)
Magpie / Sparrows
Two scrolls, mounted and framed, ink and colour on paper
1. Magpie 32 x 32.5 cm. (12 ⁵⁄₈ x 12 ⁷⁄₈ in.)
2. Sparrows 32 x 34 cm. (12 ⁵⁄₈ x 13 ³⁄₈ in.)
Each inscribed and signed, with a total of two seals of the artist
Both dated yiyou year (1945)

NOTE:
Born in Yixing, Jiangsu Province, Jiang Biwei (1899-1978) whose birth name is Tangzhen, was a writer in the Republic of China, and the second daughter of Jiang Meisheng, a professor at Fudan University. Jiang Biwei met Xu Beihong in 1916, when their relationship was formed. In 1945, their marriage came to an end. Jiang Biwei received alimony and a hundred paintings from Xu Beihong, which may include the current painting dated 1945. The hundred paintings were brought to Taiwan following by Jiang Biwei’s move in 1949, and was temporarily stored in National Museum of Taiwan History after her death. In 1984, Xu Boyang, the eldest son of Jiang Biwei and Xu Beihong came to receive the collection and had it exhibited in Hong Kong City Hall in 1990.

Formerly from the collection of Jiang Biwei (Pilleri Chiang, 1899-1978).
Sotheby’s Hong Kong, Fine Chinese Paintings, 30 April 2001, Lot 126.

Memoir by Jiang Biwei, Crown Publishing House, November 1966, inside back cover.
Modern Chinese Paintings and Calligraphic Works Selected and Collected by Madame Pilleri Chiang, China Cultural Enterprise Ltd., 1976, pp.28-29.
Catalogue of the Exhibition of the Paintings Collected by Xu Baiyang, Hong Kong, 1990, pp. 23-24.

Hong Kong, City Hall, Exhibition of the Paintings Collection by Xu Baiyang, 13-16 and 25-30 November 1990.