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14 juillet 2017

A fine and rare underglaze-blue-decorated, yellow-ground incised pear-shaped vase, Qianlong mark and period (1736-1795)

A fine and rare underglaze-blue-decorated, yellow-ground incised pear-shaped vase, Qianlong seal mark in underglaze blue and of the period (1736-1795)

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Lot 1183. A fine and rare underglaze-blue-decorated, yellow-ground incised pear-shaped vase, Qianlong seal mark in underglaze blue and of the period (1736-1795), 7¾ in. (19.7 cm.) highEstimate USD 300,000 - USD 500,000. Price realised USD 3,819,750 © Christie's Images Ltd 2013

The body is incised under an egg yolk-yellow glaze with a flaming pearl on each side being contested by a full-faced, five-clawed dragon rising above the pearl and a three-clawed dragon reaching for it from below as the two leap amidst clouds and flames bordered by slightly raised bands of leaf tips and lappets painted in underglaze blue, as are the bands of lotus sprays on the foot and at the rim, and the decoration on the highly stylized animal-head handles that may represent rhinoceros heads.

ProvenanceBertha Siegel Bleicher (1897-1986) Collection, Springfield, Massachusetts.
The Springfield Museums, Springfield, Massachusetts, accessioned 1984. 

ExhibitedRecent Gifts and Acquisitions, 10 February - 24 March 1985.

NoteOnly one other Qianlong-marked vase of this rare combination of shape and decoration appears to have been published. Now in the collection of the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, England, accession no. EA1971.37, it had been in the collection of the well-known English collector, George de Menasce, and was illustrated in the exhibition catalogue, The George de Menasce Collection, Part I, Spink, London, 1971, p. 44, no. 162. (Fig. 1)

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2016 12 15 181X128cm A3CF016587

Fig. 1. Vase with dragons and clouds, Qing Dynasty, Qianlong Period (1736 - 1795), porcelain, with underglaze painting in cobalt-blue, and incised decoration under a yellow glaze, 20 cm (height), with handles 14.5 cm (width), 14 cm (diameter), at foot 8 cm (diameter). Purchased, 1971., EA1971.37 © Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford

The stylized animal heads that form the top of the handles have sometimes been described as elephant heads but, with the single horn on top combined with the large eyes, they may be highly stylized rhinoceros heads. Variously decorated vases of this shape and with similar stylized handles which, however, have the addition of stationary rings 'suspended' from the handles, were also made during not only the Qianlong period, but also the Yongzheng period. A Yongzheng-marked example with a teadust glaze in the collection of Lord Cunliffe is illustrated by S. Jenyns in Later Chinese Porcelain, London, 1951, pl. CIV 2, and also included in the Oriental Ceramic Society exhibition, The Ceramic Art of China, London, 1951, pl. 164, no. 242, where the heads on the handles are called elephant heads. One with a Qianlong mark, decorated in underglaze blue with flower scroll on the body and neck between decorative borders, in the Huaihaitang Collection, is illustrated in the exhibition catalogue, Ethereal Elegance, Art Museum, Institute of Chinese Studies, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, 11 November 2007 - 30 March 2008, pp. 296-97, no. 101. Another Qianlong-marked soft paste porcelain vase of this latter type, with archaistic relief decoration under a white glaze, is in The Metropolitan Museum of Art and illustrated by S. Valenstein, A Handbook of Chinese Ceramics, New York, 1988, p. 264, no. 268.

Christie's. Fine Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art, 21 - 22 March 2013, New York, Rockefeller Center

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