Page 71 - Chinese Export Porcelain MARCHANT GALLERY 2015

45. Deep plate, painted with ‘La Dame au Parasol’ in an Imari palette of underglaze blue, iron-red and gilt, with a lady and
her attendant carrying a large elaborate fringed parasol beside four birds including a spoonbill and a ruff amongst reeds
and grass, encircled by a floral band in the cavetto, all beneath a wide border of eight reserves alternating with standing
ladies, two with a parasol and four different birds, all on a honeycomb iron-red and gilt ground, the underside decorated
on the rim in undeglaze blue with seven insects.
9 ⅛ inches, 23.2 cm diameter.
Qianlong, 1736-1795.
• From the collection of Dr. Hardouin, Nantes, western France.
• A similar example is illustrated by Jan Wirgin in From China to Europe, Chinese Works of Art from the Period of the
East India Companies, East Asian Museum, Stockholm, no. 186, p. 173.
• A large circular tureen, cover and stand of this pattern is illustrated by William R. Sargent in Treasures of Chinese
Export Ceramics, from the Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, Massachusetts, no. 143, pp. 277/9, where the author notes
‘Commonly called the Parasol, or Lady with a Parasol, this chinoiserie pattern is derived from a watercolour that may
have been painted by Cornelis Pronk (1691-1759) in 1734 and now in the Rijksmuseum collection. The Dutch East
India Company received it in Batavia in 1736, from where it was forwarded to both China and Japan. The porcelain
first appeared in underglaze blue, then Chinese Imari, and finally in opaque enamels. Multiple variations on this
theme were produced both in China and Japan during a thirty or forty-year period. In 1735, orders were placed for
two services, totalling 371 pieces, in the Chinese Imari colours.’
• A pair of plates are illustrated by Khalil Rizk & Conor Mahony in The Chinese Porcelain Company exhibition of
Important Chinese Export Porcelain and Works of Art, 1998, no. 35, pp. 52/3, where the author notes ‘In a resolution
of the Heeren XVII of August 31st, Pronk was commissioned by the Delft chamber of The Dutch East Company to
produce designs for porcelain which would be made and painted in China. The first group of completed porcelain
was sent back to Holland via Batavia on the Magdalena in the spring of 1737 and included blue and white, Chinese
Imari and famille rose wares. A subsequent shipment was sent from China in December 1738. These services,
created during the same period as the most brilliant Yongzheng wares, are undoubtedly some of the finest and most
beautifully rendered of all China-trade porcelains'.
• Two plates are illustrated by Maria Antónia Pinto de Matos in The RA Collection of Chinese Ceramics, A Collector’s
Vision, Volume Two, nos. 286 & 287, pp. 170/1, which the author dates to the two main production times of 1736-
1738 & 1770-1775.
• Six plates are illustrated by Regina Krahl in Chinese Ceramics from the Meiyintang Collection, Volume Two, no. 975,
pp. 286/7.

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