Table screen with auspicious elements

Greenish hetian jade has been worked to create a circular screen with relief designs on two sides, both depictions commonly found in Qing paintings. The principal scene on one side shows three of the Immortals approaching a platter with wannianqing (the shrub Rhodea japonica), a rebus for "ten thousand years green," on a terrace on the top peak. Symbols of immortality occur elsewhere as well: a peach and a fungus in the Immortals' hands and clouds floating over pine trees. The deep grooves and wide bevel strokes used resemble ink brushwork in paintings. The composition, too, resembles a painting with a vertically arranged perspective.

The rear side of the screen presents miscellaneous antiques (bogu): an instrument, qin, associated with intellectuals, in the foreground; to the left, a bamboo brush holder containing a fungus from which a jade disc is hanging, two painting scrolls, and a cane for an old sage; in the center, an ancient vase decorated with animal masks derived from ancient bronzes and holding a flute belonging to one of the Eight Immortals; and to the right of the vase, the phoenix deity, who carries a treasure vessel from which water chestnuts float upward. A thin layer was evenly peeled from the surface to produce the relief.