Mischievous Pandas

ZHANG SHANZI (1882-1940)
Mischievous Pandas
A set of twenty-four unmounted scrolls, ink on paper
Each leaf measures 27.5 x 21 cm. (10 ⁷⁄₈ x 8 ¹⁄₄ in.)
NOTE:
Four additional pencil sketches are drawn on xuan paper, one of which with a Dafengtang watermark.

This extraordinary set of twenty-four paintings of pandas were likely created by Zhang Shanzi in America as a playful gift for his daughter Xinjia. Between 1939 and 1940, the artist travelled to North America in order to fundraise for war relief efforts by exhibiting and selling his paintings. Unusually, fifteen scrolls were painted on paper bearing the watermark of Challenge Bond, nine the watermark of Liberty Linen Bond. According to Watermarks and Brands Used in the American Paper Trade published by the Lyman Derby Post in 1909, the paper printed with the watermarks Challenge Bond and Liberty Linen Bond were produced by Alling & Cory Co. and Western Pennsylvania Paper Co. respectively. He often sketched during his travels, and the notebook-sized papers could be easily carried, including on transpacific crossings.

It is suggested that he painted this special set for Xinjia, then a young girl who was fond of the animal and whom he missed dearly. With few other known examples of paintings of the kind, the present lot enriches and expands existing scholarship of Zhang Shanzi's oeuvre.