Lot 877. A Baishe 'Moon and Prunus’ conical tea bowl, Song dynasty (AD 960-1279); 4 1/2 in. (11.4 cm.) diam., cloth box. Price realised USD 50,400 (Estimate USD 8,000 – USD 12,000). © Christie's Images Ltd 2023

The bowl is carved through the pale milky-blue glaze on the interior with a blossoming prunus spray and a crescent moon. The details and the interior rim edge are painted in a reddish-brown slip and the recessed unglazed base is inscribed in black ink with the character hai (sea).

Provenance: J. J. Lally & Co., New York, no. 4902.

Note: A bowl of the same form and design is illustrated by R. Krahl in Chinese Ceramics from the Meiyintang Collection, vol. 1, London, 1994, p. 278, no. 515, where it is noted that similar wares with a light blue qingbai glaze applied over a slip have been excavated at the Baishe kilns in Nanfeng county, Jiangxi province. A similar small conical bowl excavated at Baishe is illustrated in Kaogu, 1985, No. 3, pl. 6: 1 & 2, and in a line drawing on p. 226, fig. 4:1. Another very similar Baishe ‘moon and prunus’ tea bowl from the Turner Collection, now in the Columbia Museum of Art, Columbia, North Carolina, is illustrated in Eye to the East: The Turner Collection of Chinese Art, Columbia, 2008, p. 64.

This motif is also found on white stoneware boxes and covers made at the nearby Jizhou kilns, such as the example illustrated by R. Krahl in Chinese Ceramics from the Meiyintang Collection, vol. 1, London, 1994, p. 279, no. 517, and another from the Falk Collection, sold at Christie's New York, 16 October 2001, lot 96.

Christie's. J. J. Lally & Co., New York, 23 march 2023