A rare and massive blue and white 'Filial Piety' beaker vase, Qing dynasty, Kangxi period. Photo Sotheby's

the tall cylindrical body gently flaring towards the mouth and foot, painted around the exterior in brilliant and varying tones of cobalt-blue with twenty-four ogival panels, each enclosing one example from the Twenty-four Paragons of Filial Piety, the panels connected by smaller panels enclosing precious objects, all reserved against a ground painted with various diaper patterns, above a narrow band of lobed panels enclosing flowering plants alternating with panels enclosing antiques, the design repeated in the broad band of pendant lappets below. Height 38 1/2  in., 97.7 cm. Estimation 150,000 — 200,000 USD 

PROVENANCE: Sotheby's London, 12 July 2006, lot 88.

NOTE: The vase is identical to a set of three in the State Art Collection Dresden. Eva Strober, the former curator of the Oriental Department at the Zwinger Museum, Dresden, now Curator for Asian Ceramics at the Ceramic Museum het Princessehof, Leeuwarden, Netherlands, confirmed in 2006, that the Dresden collection holds a garniture of three; two covered vases and a beaker vase. However, in the 1721 inventory of Augustus the Strong, Elector of Saxony and King of Poland five pieces are listed as ' N = 7 vv Blau und Weiss Ostindisch Porcelain, worauff allerhand Mennern und Figuren in Schilden gemahlet sind.' Close examination of a photograph (dating to 1933) from the Archives of the Porcelain Collection, showing the still complete five-piece garniture set (decorated with depictions of the ‘24 scenes of filial piety’) from the former Royal Collection of Augustus the Strong - consisting of two beaker vases and three covered jars reveals that the present beaker vase is not one of the five. One of the Dresden Collection set, a large vase and cover, is discussed and illustrated in R.L. Hobson, Chinese Pottery and Porcelain, vol. II, New York and London, 1915, Pl. 91, fig. 3. On page 134 the author notes the vase "from a set of five, is one of the large vases in the Dresden collection which tradition says, were obtained by Augustus the Strong from the King of Prussian in exchange for a regiment of dragoons. It is decorated with panels illustrating the stories of the Twenty-four Paragons of Filial Piety." Given that the present vase is not one of the two missing elements of the Dresden group, and there appear to be no other published pieces of this rare subject matter in this massive size, perhaps this is the last remaining piece of another set made at the same time.

Sotheby's. Fine Chinese Ceramics & Works of Art. New York | 17 sept. 2013 - http://www.sothebys.com/