A fine Guan-Type Faceted Vase (Hu).  Qianlong Seal Mark And Period. Photo Sotheby's

well-potted of canted rectangular section, the pear-shaped body supported by a splayed foot, rising gently to a slightly waisted neck flanked by a pair of tubular handles, covered overall with a rich, evenly applied pale green glaze, the unglazed footring with a brown wash, four-character seal mark in underglaze blue. Height 5 3/4 in., 15 cm. Estimate 40,000-60,000 USD

PROVENANCE: Collection of Johanna and Frank Uhl and thence by descent. The vase was purchased in Shanghai during the 1940s.

NOTE: While the form is derived originally from Shang and Zhou dynasty metal prototypes, the thick lustrous glaze and brown-washed footring of the present vase are evocative of Song dynasty ceramic renderings of the earlier form. The best known of the Song examples are guan wares from the imperial kilns which were much admired by the antiquityloving Qing court.

A similar example in the National Palace Museum in Taipei is published in the Illustrated Catalogue of the Ch'ing Dynasty Porcelain in the National Palace Museum Ch'ien-lung Ware and Other Wares, Tokyo, 1981, pl. 82; another from the collection in the Art Gallery, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong was included in the exhibition Qing Imperial Porcelain of the Kangxi, Yongzheng and Qianlong Reigns, Hong Kong, 1995, cat. no. 63; and two other vases, one with a crackled and the other with a plain guan-type glaze, are published in Regina Krahl, Chinese Ceramics from the Meiyintang Collection, vol. II, London, 1994, pls. 874 and 875. Two more are illustrated in Qing Imperial Monochromes The Zande Lou Collection, Art Museum The Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2005, pl. 32.

Sotheby's. Fine Chinese Ceramics & Works of Art. New York | 20 Mar 2012 www.sothebys.com