Chinese Four Panel Screen Set with Stylized Lattice

Four folding screen leaves with cross-pattern lattice windows and carved lower panels.

This four panel screen set with stylized lattice is from Shanxi Province, China, and dates to the 19th century. It is carved elm wood. Tibetans were traditionally semi-nomadic and owned few personal furnishings, so most Tibetan furniture stood in monasteries, and some of it was carted over the Himalayas to India as monasteries were destroyed. Each panel has a rectangular frame with open geometric fretwork at the top, a narrow carved band, then a solid panel carved with a round medallion. A small pierced key-pattern strip finishes the bottom. Rich reddish brown. It is 80 inches long, 2 deep and 67 high.

A folding wall that insists on being looked at.