Lot 37. A blue and white ‘Dragon’ vase, yuhuchunping, Yuan dynasty; 28.8cm., 11 3/8 in. Estimate 6,783 - 9,496 EUR. Lot sold 27,878 EUR. Photo courtesy Sotheby's.

the pear-shaped body rising from a spreading foot to a tall waisted neck flaring at the rim, freely painted to the exterior with a three-clawed dragon chasing a flaming pearl, the interior rim encircled by a foliate band, textile stand and Japanese wood box. Quantité: 2 

Provenance: Mayuyama & Co. Ltd., Tokyo.
Hirano Kotoken.

Exhibition: Gen Min meihin ten [Exhibition of Yuan and Ming ceramics], The Japan Ceramic Society, Nihonbashi Takashimaya, Tokyo, 1956, cat. no. 62.
Chūgoku Sō Gen bijutsu ten [Chinese art of the Sung and Yuan periods], Tokyo National Museum, Tokyo, 1961, cat. no. 294.
Chūgoku tōji meiho ten [Exhibition of the Great Works of Chinese Ceramics], The Gotoh Museum, Tokyo, 1966.
Chūgoku bijutsu ten series: Sō Gen no bijutsu [Chinese art exhibition series; The art of Song and Yuan dynasty], vol. 4, Osaka Art Museum, Osaka, 1978, cat. no. 1-240.

Bibliography: Seiichi Okuda, Sakutarou Tanaka, Fukosai Hirota, Haruzo Hayashi (eds), Chūgoku no tōji [Chinese ceramics], Tokyo, 1955, pl. 237.
Ryoichi Fujioka, Tōki zenshū: Gen Min sho no sometsuke [The complete works of ceramics: The first blue and white ceramics form Yuan and Ming dynasty], Tokyo, 1960, pl. 5.
Ryūsen Shūhō. Sōgyō shichijū shūnen kinen/Mayuyama: Seventy Years, Tokyo, 1976, vol. 1, pl. 703.

Note: A bottle vase similarly painted in underglaze blue with three-clawed dragons chasing a flaming pearl, excavated at Wutonghua in Inner Mongolia, was included in the exhibition Empires Beyond the Great Wall, Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, Los Angeles, 1994, cat. no. 91; two similar vases were in the Charles Russell collection: one later in the Ataka collection and now in the Museum of Oriental Ceramics, Osaka, included in the Museum’s exhibition Blue and White Wares in Yuan Dynasty. 14th Century Ching-te Chen Wares, Osaka, 1985, cat. no. 24, was sold in these rooms, 12th February 1936, lot 75; the other, later in the Alfred Clark and Meiyintang collections, was sold in our Hong Kong rooms, 7th April 2011, lot 38; another vase was sold in our New York rooms, 31st/1st March/April 2005, lot 101; and a further example with a key-fret border around the foot, was sold in our Hong Kong rooms, 28th April 1998, lot 726.

An important Blue and White'Dragon' bottle vase. Yuan Dynasty, from the Alfred Clark and Meiyintang collections; 24.7 cm., 9 3/4 in. Sold for 9,620,000 HKD at Sotheby's Hong Kong , 7th April 2011, lot 38. Photo Sotheby's 2011

Cf. my post: Blue and White 'Lotus' Guan Jar, 'Dragon' bottle vase & Qingbai Ewer and Cover. Yuan Dynasty

A very rare blue and white 'dragon' vase (yuhuchunping), Yuan Dynasty; 9 3/4 in., 24.8 cm. Sold for 216,000 USD at Sotheby's New York, 31st March 2005, lot 101. Photo Sotheby's 2005

of slender pear shape, the well-rounded lower body elegantly tapering to a thin waisted neck flaring widely to a trumpet mouth, boldly painted in a deep cobalt-blue with an animated 'three-clawed' dragon, its writhing body undulating around the body of the vase with scaly limbs striding amidst stylized flame and cloud motifs, its grinning face eagerly gazing towards a single 'flaming pearl', the interior rim painted with a band of linked scrolls, all against a milky-colored ground with tinges of light greyish-blue.

Note: A similar bottle vase excavated at Wutonghua, Wengniute Banner, north of Chifeng, Inner Mongolia, was included in the exhibition Empires Beyond the Great Wall, Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, Los Angeles, 1994, cat.no. 91. Two other vases of this form with similar rim border in the interior, formerly in the Charles Russell collection are now in Japan: one sold in our London rooms, 12th February 1936, lot 75, later in the Ataka collection and now in the Museum of Oriental Ceramics, Osaka, was included in the Exhibition of Blue and White Wares in Yuan Dynasty, 14th Century Ching-te Chên Wares, Museum of Oriental Ceramics, Osaka, cat.no. 24; the other, later in the Alfred Clark collection, was included in the exhibition Far Eastern Blue-and-White Porcelain, Mitsukoshi, Tokyo, 1977, cat.no. 12. Another dragon bottle with a simplified keyfret border around the foot and the missing neck replaced in gilded wood, was sold in our Hong Kong rooms, 28th April 1998, lot 726.

Compare also a bottle vase painted with five-clawed dragons among clouds, unearthed from Xingyang county in Henan province and now in the Henan Provincial Museum, Zhengzhou, illustrated in Ye Peilan, Yuandai ciqi [Yuan dynasty porcelain], Beijing, 1998, pl. 90B, together with another in the Museum of Chinese History, Beijing, pl. 90A.

Sotheby's. The Soul of Japanese Aesthetics – The Tsuneichi Inoue Collection, Londres, 13 mai 2015, 10:00 AM