China, Album Of Six Erotic Paintings, 19th Century

Six "images of the Palace of Spring" gathered in an album, like so many distinct scenes of eroticism where lasciviousness seems a pretext for aesthetics.
The action takes place mainly indoors. Their composition is all structured around a play on foreground and background, an architectural, furniture, or plant element opening a "window"; they thus share the common feature of including, in addition to their protagonists, other characters: spectators, voyeurs, or passersby.
These images do not present a narrative; Each painting evokes a moment of shared pleasure, imbued with a natural, gentle, even tender eroticism, unfolding within the flow of daily life and its ordinary activities.
Intense colors and refined detail characterize these watercolor and gold paint paintings on black "lacquered" paper – the colors are more vibrant than they appear in the photos, which give the impression of fading, which is not the case.
Qing Dynasty, 19th century.
Each painting is framed by assembled strips of paper and backed with a page.
For a similar example with 12 views, see "The House of Courtesans" from the Bertholet Collection sale by Sotheby's Hong Kong on April 29, 2022, lot 3669.

Complete album, bound with a simple cardboard cover.
Very good condition of the paintings – a few minor scratches.
Good condition of the album – a fragment of paper on the inside cover (no paintings are missing); tears, stains, and a long scratch on the cover; detachments at two of the frames by strips of paper.
31.8 cm x 26.6 cm for the cover.
c. 23.3 cm wide x c. 23.5 cm high for the paintings – small differences from one to the other.