Lot 2114. A very rare pale celadon-glazed chrysanthemum vase, juban ping, Kangxi period (1662-1722); 8 1/2 in. (21.8 cm.) high. Estimate HKD 150,000 - HKD 250,000. Price realised HKD 860,000. © Christie's Images Ltd 2012

The ovoid body is moulded with a band of chrysanthemum petals above the ring foot, surmounted by a tall neck flaring towards the. It is covered overall in an even pale green glaze. The white base is inscribed in underglaze-blue with an apocryphal Chenghua six-character mark, ivory stand.

Provenance: J. Insley Blair (1870-1939) and thence by descent to the present owners 

Literature: The J. Insley Blair Collection of Chinese Porcelain, Tuxedo Park, New York, 1925, pl. 1, no. 114 

Note: It is interesting to note that the present vase appears to be the only Kangxi period example of this type of 'chrysanthemum' vases inscribed with an apocryphal Chenghua mark as other published examples are with Kangxi marks. It is possible that the present vase dates to the early Kangxi period. 

Three Kangxi-marked examples are published; the first is in the Beijing Palace Museum Collection, illustrated in Sekai Toji Zhenshu, Ceramic Art of the World, vol. 15, Shogakukan, 1983, p. 40, pl. 32. The second example, a bequest of Benjamin Altman in 1913 to the Metropolitan Museum, is illustrated by S.G. Valenstein, A Handbook of Chinese Ceramics, New York, 1989, p. 241, no. 244, where it is dated to the late Kangxi period. The third is in the Freer Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., illustrated in The World's Great Collections, Oriental Ceramics, vol. 9, Kodansha, Tokyo, 1981, pl. 22. Vases of this form are also known decorated with peachbloom and white glazes, see, op. cit., 1989, p. 237, no. 233 (part of a set of eight peachbloom-glazed objects of the writing table), and p. 238, no. 239 respectively.