TABLE EN HUANGHUALI

The present table appears to be the mate to a huanghuali table of almost identical size and proportions illustrated by Gustav Ecke in Chinese Domestic Furniture, Rutland, Vermont and Tokyo, 1944, no. 45, pls. 59-62, and in the John Hope-Johnstone Esq. collection. The numerous line drawings of the table included in the text suggest that Dr. Ecke highly regarded the table and recognized the rarity of this form. Like the illustrated table, the present table features rare rope-twist and bi-disc carved decoration at the waist above openwork, elongated S-shaped spandrels, and carved feet. The similarities in the decoration suggest that these tables were part of the same special commission.
Ulrich Spalinger was born in Dachsen, Switzerland in 1869. At the age of seventeen, he travelled to Guangzhou working as a silk inspector for Jarine Matheson & Co. and later founded the company U. Spalinger (or U. Spalinger & Co. S.A.) in Guangzhou and Hong Kong. He and his wife Martha Spalinger-Bebié returned to Switzerland in 1939, and became founding members of the Society of Friends of East Asian Culture, known today as Asia Society Switzerland.