Page 110 - Bonhams Chinese Art London May 2013
P. 110
Another Property 另一件藏品 The subject of five boys fighting for a helmet is a very popular motif in
China meaning five boys competing for distinction, which symbolises the
73 † blessing for one’s son to achieve outstanding results in the civil service
examinations. Helmet (kui 魁) is a pun for ‘leader’, which also indicates
A rare famille rose turquoise-ground ‘boys’ vase first place in the Palace examination. The five boys refer to the children
Daoguang seal mark and of the period of Dou Yujun (竇禹鈞), the scholar, educator and official during the Five
The ovoid body delicately and skilfully enamelled with a young man Dynasties period (907-960), whose eminent sons achieved remarkable
clothed in a rose enamelled robe and wearing a gilt cap, holding aloft success in the civil service examinations, earning him reverence as the
a large gilded headdress and surrounded by four smaller boys leaping ideal parent.
excitedly to reach for the headdress, all set within a scene of rockwork
and pines continuing onto the reverse decorated with a flowering Compare related Daoguang vases, but decorated with a ruby ground
pomegranate branch laden with two heavy fruit bursting open and one around the elongated neck and foot, such as one depicting children in
unripe fruit, all beneath turquoise-ground borders containing double- a Dragon Boat Race, and another decorated with fruiting pomegranate
seeded lotus scrolls enclosing four bats at the neck and simple lotus trees, illustrated in The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace
scrolls at the foot. Museum: Porcelains with Cloisonné Enamel Decoration and Famille-Rose
19.1cm (7½in) high Decoration, Hong Kong, 1999, pls.189 and 194.
£200,000 - 250,000
HK$2,400,000 - 2,900,000 CNY1,900,000 - 2,400,000 A famille rose bottle vase, Daoguang mark and period, similarly
enamelled with four boys in a garden around an older boy wearing a
清道光 粉彩松石綠地五子奪魁圖罐 礬紅「大清道光年製」篆書款 gold official’s cap holding a golden helmet over his head, was sold at
Sotheby’s Hong Kong on 7 October 2010, lot 2162.
Provenance: an English private collection
來源：英國私人收藏
106 | Bonhams
