Lot 6. A 'robin's-egg' blue lantern vase, Incised seal mark and period of Qianlong (1736-1795); 23.7 cm., 9 3/8 in. Estimate 1,000,000-1,200,000 HKD. Lot sold 1,940,000 HKD. Photo Sotheby's

the ovoid shaped body rising to a short waisted neck and supported on a straight foot, applied with two flat vase-shaped mock handles, brightly covered with an opaque turquoise-blue glaze of robin's-egg type suffused overall with a finely mottled dark purplish blue, the base incised with a six-character reign mark all beneath the glaze, the unglazed foot dressed in a brown wash.

EXHIBITED: Chinese Ceramics from the Meiyintang Collection, The British Museum, London, 1994.
Evolution to Perfection. Chinese Ceramics from the Meiyintang Collection/ Evolution vers la perfection. Céramiques de Chine de la Collection Meiyintang, Sporting d'Hiver, Monte Carlo, 1996, cat. no. 179.

LITTERATURE: Regina Krahl, Chinese Ceramics from the Meiyintang Collection, London, 1994-2010, vol. 2, no. 923.

NOTE: This so-called 'lantern' shape, with its unusual vase-shaped flanges on either side, originated in the Yongzheng period, when it was made with guan-type and ge-type glazes, but in the Qianlong period it became a characteristic form for the robin's-egg glaze; compare two Yongzheng examples in the Palace Museum, Beijing, illustrated in Geng Baochang, ed., Gugong Bowuyuan cang Qingdai yuyao ciqi [Qing porcelains from the Imperial kilns preserved in the Palace Museum], Beijing, 2005, pls. 174 and 206.

Similar Qianlong 'robin's-egg' vases are in the National Palace Museum, Taiwan, illustrated in Qing Kang Yong Qian ming ci tezhan / Catalog of the Special Exhibition of K'ang-hsi, Yung-cheng and Ch'ien-lung Porcelain Ware from the Ch'ing Dynasty in the National Museum Palace [sic], Taipei, 1986, cat. no. 93; in the Jingdezhen Ceramic Museum, see Chūgoku kogei bijutsu sōsho. Chūgoku tōji hen [Chinese arts and crafts series. Chinese ceramics], vol. I: Keitokuchin jiki [Jingdezhen porcelains], Kyoto, 1982, p. 88 bottom left; and one from the Grandidier collection in the Musée Guimet, Paris, is published in Oriental Ceramics: The World's Great Collections, Tokyo, New York, San Francisco, 1980-82, vol. VII, fig. 184. This shape was still produced in this glaze colour in the Jiaqing period, see a piece in the National Palace Museum, Taipei, included in the Museum's exhibition Qingdai danse you ciqi tezhan [Special exhibition of monochrome glazed porcelain of the Qing dynasty], Taipei, 1981, cat. no. 56.

Vase à décor "oeuf de rouge-gorge", règne de Qianlong (1736-1795), fours de jingdezhen, porcelaine. H: 24,5 cm, Diam: 14,6 cm. Collection Ernest Grandidier, G874. Paris, musée Guimet - musée national des Arts asiatiques. Photo © RMN-Grand Palais (MNAAG, Paris) / Richard Lambert

Sotheby's. The Meiyintang Collection, Part III - An Important Selection of Imperial Chinese Porcelains, Hong Kong | 04 avr. 2012