Page 136 - Christies IMportant Chinese Art Sept 26 2020 NYC

PROPERTY FROM THE LENORA AND WALTER F. BROWN
COLLECTION
1596
A RARE MASSIVE FAMILLE ROSE
SGRAFFIATO RUBY-GROUND 'HUNDRED
BOYS' VASE
QIANLONG-JIAQING PERIOD (1736-1820)
The vase is finely decorated on either side with scenes
of boys at play in a garden, enclosed within shaped
panels decorated with bats and all reserved on a
sgraffiato ruby-enameled ground interspersed with
lotus and other leafy floral sprays between borders of
ruyi heads above and key-fret below. The waisted neck
is decorated with bats suspending chimes and lotus
blossoms suspending endless knots and twin fish, and
is flanked by a pair of molded kui-dragon handles.
30¿ in. (76.5 cm.) high

$40,000-60,000
PROVENANCE:
Private collection, Europe.
The Lenora and Walter F. Brown Collection, San
Antonio, Texas.

A famille rose vase, also of impressively large size (31
in. high), dated to the 18th century, Qianlong period,
in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, is illustrated by
S. Valenstein, A Handbook of Chinese Ceramics, New
York, 1975, pl. 168. Like the present vase, it is decorated
with figural scenes within panels on the body, with
further panels on the neck flanked by dragon handles.
Although the ground on which the panels are reserved
is decorated with mille fleurs, it can nevertheless be
related to the present vase for its overall effect of rich
ornamentation and impressive detail. A Qianlong-
marked famille rose vase of similar shape and
comparable size (27æ in.) but on a turquoise ground
from the Marchant collection was sold in Marchant:
Nine Decades in Chinese Art; 14 September 2017, lot
748.

For a discussion of boys at play, see the note to lot 1616
in the present catalogue.

清乾隆/嘉慶 粉彩寶石紅地錦上添花開光百子圖大瓶