Page 112 - 2019 September 10th Sotheby's Important Chinese Art Jades, Met Museum Irving Collection NYC

42 A FINE PEACHBLOOM-GLAZED
SEAL PASTE BOX AND COVER
㶭 寯 炈 KANGXI MARK AND PERIOD
⹟ 寮 ⣏ of compressed circular form set over a tapered foot, the exterior
䅁ġġġ 䲭 㶭 covered in a crushed raspberry-red glaze transmuting to pink,
慱 ⹟ some areas mottled with green and Þ ne black ß ecks, the interior
⌘ 䅁 and base glazed white, the latter with a six-character mark in
㲍 ⸜ underglaze blue (2)
味 墥
䙺 炉
㫦 Diameter 2⅞ in., 7.3 cm

PROVENANCE Ը๕
Spink & Son, London, 7th August 1987. ŔűŪůŬġħġŔŰů炻ΐ㔎炻IJĺĹĸ⸜Ĺ㚰ĸ㖍
Collection of Florence (1920-2018) and Herbert (1917-2016) ἃ伭ΐ㕗ġĩIJĺijıĮijıIJĹĪġ⍲崓ỗ䈡ġĩIJĺIJĸĮijıIJķĪɀ
Irving, no. 777.
㫸暚ằ⃟㓞啷炻䶐嘇ĸĸĸ
$ 40,000-60,000

Peachbloom-glazed wares rank amongst the most admired of
Kangxi porcelains. The present seal paste box, also known as
yinse he or ‘vermilion box’, belongs to one of eight peachbloom-
glazed wares made for the scholar’s table. The glaze, also
known in Chinese as ‘apple red’, ‘bean red’, or ‘drunken beauty’,
required the utmost technical precision. To create this e# ect, a
copper-lime pigment was blown through a bamboo tube onto a
layer of clear glaze and then covered with another layer of clear
glaze. This resulted in the variegated pink and occasional green
tones, depending on the Þ ring conditions.
Similar seal boxes can be found in the Metropolitan Museum of
Art, New York, illustrated in Suzanne G. Valenstein, A Handbook
of Chinese Ceramics, New York, 1989, Þ g. 237; in the Palace
Museum, Beijing, published in Kangxi. Yongzheng. Qianlong.
Qing Porcelain from the Palace Museum, Hong Kong, 1989, pl.
124; and in the National Palace Museum, Taipei, included in
the Museum’s Special Exhibition of K’ang-hsi, Yung-cheng and
Ch’ien-lung Porcelain Ware from the Ch’ing Dynasty, Taipei, 1986,
cat. no. 11. See also examples sold at auction: in these rooms,
15th March 2017, lot 697; in our London rooms, 5th November
2014, lot 160; and in our Hong Kong rooms, 5th October 2011, lot
1996. See also one formerly in the collection of the Metropolitan
Museum of Art, sold at Christie’s New York, 15th September
2016, lot 917.

110 SOTHEBY’S