A fine and rare blue and white flaring brushpot, bitong, Early Kangxi, two-character mark Qing Wan. Photo courtesy Bonhams

Painted around the body in the manner of an unrolling scroll with two bearded sages and a young attendant emerging from rockwork and pine towards two bearded scholars seated playing 'weiqi' at a simple table, the design all below a horizontal border simulating herring-bone pattern silk mounting, and above a characteristic band of wet dots 19.5cm (7¾in) diam. Estimate £55,000 - 65,000 (€66,000 - 78,000) - Unsold

Provenance : S.Marchant and Son, London, 

Exhibition, Transitional and 17th Century Porcelain 
Christie's London, 13 June 1990, lot 22, The Jarras Collection, Part I: Fine Export Porcelain 

The exaggerated curve of the sides of the present lot is particularly notable, and places this brushpot within a small group of such strongly-potted wares dating to the early Kangxi period. The 'wet dot' band at the foot and the two-character Qing Wan mark also suggest an early Kangxi date. See for example a similarly shaped brushpot from the Shanghai Museum with a Qing Wan mark, also with 'wet dot' marks at the foot and 'cracked-ice' at the rim, and with a similar style of continuous landscape painting on the flaring sides, illustrated inSeventeenth Century Jingdezhen Porcelain from the Shanghai Museum and the Butler Collections: Beauty's Enchantment, Shanghai, 2005, pp.238-239, no.82.

Compare a related but slightly smaller brushpot dated to the early Kangxi period and also with the Qing Wan mark, sold in these rooms, 10 November 2011, lot 136.

Bonhams. FINE CHINESE ART. London, New Bond Street. 7 Nov 2013