Lot 8, An exquisite and rare pair of carved ‘Yaozhou’ bowls , Northern Song dynasty. Estimate 500,000 — 700,000 HKD (58,472 - 81,860 EUR). Photo Sotheby's.

each of conical form, finely potted with wide flaring sides rising from a short straight foot to a lipped rim, the interior deftly and intricately carved with three lush peony blooms and trefoil leaves issuing from two parallel stalks, the petals and the leaves further accentuated with combed details, all below a line border, freely decorated on the exterior with stylised blooms and broad leaves, applied overall in an olive-green glaze that pools to a deeper tone in the recessed areas, the knife-pared foot unglazed revealing the grey ware; 15.8 cm, 6 1/4  in.

Provenance: Collection of Charles E. Russell (1866-1960). 
Sotheby's London, 12th July 1960, lots 156 (£1100) and 157 (£1200). 
Bluett & Sons Ltd, London, 1960 (£2300).
Collection of Roger Pilkington (1928-69), from 1960 (£2300).

Exhibited: International Exhibition of Chinese Art, Royal Academy of Arts, London, 1935-36, cat. nos. 1346 and 1348.

Literature: Roy Davids and Dominic Jellinek, Provenance. Collectors, Dealers and Scholars: Chinese Ceramics in Britain and America, Great Haseley, 2011, pl. 133.

Note: This pair of ‘Yaozhou’ bowls – although very classic in style – appears to be unique, and it is exceedingly rare to find a pair of bowls that must have remained together from the Song dynasty (960-1279) until today, since it would not have been possible to match two virtually identical pieces of such rarity at any time thereafter.

The Yaozhou kilns of Huangpu district, Yao county, near Tongchuan in Shaanxi province are renowned for their vast production of tea and food bowls and repeated many designs identically in large quantities, but also made small numbers of more individually fashioned items. Like the ‘Yaozhou’ holy water sprinkler, lot 5, which was shown together with the present pair of bowls in the 1935 exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts in London, and sold together with this pair in the Charles Russell sale at Sotheby's London, they rank among the finest ‘Yaozhou’ wares of the Song dynasty. When sold in 1960, their uniqueness was already fully appreciated, as they fetched an extraordinarily high price, together nearly four times the price of the holy water sprinkler.

It is extremely rare to find ‘Yaozhou’ bowls that are decorated overall, with the design on the inside completely filling all available space, right up to the rim, and with decoration also on the outside which is usually plain. Typically, ‘Yaozhou’ bowls are decorated on the interior only, the design leaving free a plain broad band at the rim. The delicate overall carved motifs give these bowls an air of exquisite filigree work. Since these two bowls are so similar to each other and so different from the general ‘Yaozhou’ production, that no closely related examples appear to be recorded, they may have been specially made as a pair, while in general today pairs of Song bowls tend to be matched by chance.

Fragments of two related bowls, also decorated on the outside, but with the typical undecorated band at the rim, have been recovered from the kiln site and are illustrated in Songdai Yaozhou yaozhi/The Yaozhou Kiln Site of the Song Period, Beijing, 1998, pl. 29, figs. 1 and 2, and p. 129, fig. 71: 10; together with two other bowls of that type with plain rim border and plain outside, pl. 29, fig. 3, and p. 131, fig. 72: 1 and 2.

Other bowls with related carved decoration, with plain rim borders, tend to show somewhat different versions of this carved flower design. Most closely related are another pair of bowls, with the flowers springing from one stem, with one large bloom and two buds, plain rim border, and with loose scrollwork on the outside, offered in these rooms 31st October 1995, lot 345; and a single bowl included in the exhibition Yoshuyo no seiji/Celadon of Yaozhou Ware, Museum of Oriental Ceramics, Osaka, 1991, cat. no. 25. A related pattern, also with two flowers with crossed stems, but reversed in mirror image, and with one or two of the blooms depicted smaller, in bud stage, was used for production on a larger scale, with a broad plain band at the rim inside and undecorated outsides; compare a bowl sold in our London rooms, 11th December 1984, lot 248; another sold at Christie's New York, 16th September 2011, lot 1467.

For a note on the former owner of these bowls, Charles Earnest Russell, see lot 5.

Sotheby's. The Pilkington Collection of Chinese Art, Hong Kong, 06 Apr 2016, 10:00 AM