Lot 3646. A fine pair of famille-rose ‘Balsam Pear’ bowls, Seal Marks and Period of Qianlong (1736-1795); 10.8 cm., 4 1/4  in. Estimate 500,000 — 700,000 HKD. Lot sold  1,240,000 HKD. Photo Sotheby’s

each delicately potted with deep rounded sides rising from a short foot to an everted rim, the exterior finely enamelled with leafy bamboo shoots and a butterfly fluttering over a branch of blossoming and fruiting balsam pear, the branch extending over the rim and onto the interior, issuing further clusters of foliage and two balsam pears, the base inscribed in underglaze blue with a six-character seal mark.

Note: A pair of bowls of this type, from the Sir Percival David collection and now in the British Museum, London, is illustrated in Catalogue of Ch’ing Enamelled Wares, London, 1958, pl. 897; a bowl in the Musee Guimet, Paris, is included in Oriental Ceramics. The World Great Collections, vol. 7, Tokyo, 1981, pl. 91; another is published in the Illustrated Catalogue of Tokyo National Museum. Chinese Ceramics, vol. 2, Tokyo, 1980, pl. 660; and a further pair of bowls, from the Alfred Beit Foundation, was sold in our London rooms, 6th November 2013, lot 78.

Sotheby’s. Fine Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art, Hong Kong, 08 oct. 2014