Lot 178. A very rare small lobed silver stem cup, Tang dynasty (618-907), 1¾ in. (4.5 cm.) high. Estimate GBP 20,000 - GBP 30,000. Price realised GBP 30,000 © Christie's Images Ltd 2011

The gently rounded body divided into eight lobes and supported on a short stem with a wide fluted lobed foot, delicately chased and engraved with ducks and parrots, some in flight, others alternately facing each other, all set in a landscape amidst rocks and trees, all reserved on a ring-punched ground, the base incised with an illegible character. 

Provenance: By repute, purchased from Kusaka Shogado in Kyoto, Japan, in the 1930s. 

From the Martin Mansson Collection. 

Martin Mansson (1880-1952) was a Swedish entrepreneur with early links to Russia and Japan. From 1911-1917 he lived in St.Petersburg where he owned a company selling high-quality Swedish stainless steel. In addition to learning the Russian language, he became interested in contemporary Russian art, and became acquainted with several painters, including Ilya Repin, and his students. His painting collection, numbering several dozen, was shipped back to Stockholm well before 1917, when he was obliged to return home.

Although he first visited Japan in 1907, it was in 1920 that he returned to the country to set up a sales operation similar to that in St. Petersburg which had been halted three years earlier. He spent several years in Osaka and Kobe, when his interest in Japanese works of art commenced. Once again he realized the benefit of learning the language in order to facilitate the acquiring of works of art. The result was a fine collection of woodblock prints, netsuke, inro, porcelain (in particular Kakiemon vases), swords, lacquer and silver. 

It was in the 1930s, when back in Japan, that he extended his collection to include Chinese art. Fine porcelain, Tang silver, and Shang bronzes were his particular interests, and he studied these subjects both in books and through his discussions with his friend Kusaka Shogado, who was a leading dealer based in Kyoto, and from whom he made many purchases. Martin Mansson visited Japan for the last time in 1938, when he bought numerous items for his collection.

Note: Compare a very similar eight-lobed stemcup formerly in the Carl Kempe Collection and illustrated by Bo Gyllensvard in Chinese Gold Silver and Porcelain: The Kempe Collection, New York, 1974, p. 57, pl. 54, where the author references the current cup, from the M. Mansson collection. 

Christie's. Fine Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art, 10 May 2011, London, King Street