Page 95 - Sotheby's Sir Quo Wei Lei Collection Oct. 3, 2018

Bowls decorated with the ‘Three Rams’ design are extremely
rare, although a comparable example in the National Palace
Museum, Taipei, is illustrated in the National Palace Museum
Quarterly, vol. II, no. 3, 1968, pp. 29-45, pl. XII. See another
bowl of this type, from the Baur collection, Geneva, included
in the Oriental Ceramic Society exhibition The Animal in
Chinese Art, London, 1968, cat. no. 259, and also published
in John Ayers, The Baur Collection, Geneva, vol. II, Geneva,
1969, pl. A154, where Ayers notes that Tao shuo [Description
of Ceramics] lists among wares made in this reign circular
dishes decorated inside with the three rams, emblematic
of the reviving power of the Spring. A third example can
be found in the Shanghai Museum illustrated in Zhongguo
taoci quanji [Complete series on Chinese ceramics], vol. 12,
Shanghai, 2000, pl. 157. The only pair to have appeared at
auction is a pair from the collection of J.M. Hu, sold in our New
York rooms, 4th June 1985, lot 15, and again in these rooms,
9th October 2007, lot 1559, and now in the Alan Chuang
collection, illustrated in Julian Thompson. The Alan Chuang
Collection of Chinese Porcelain, Hong Kong, 2009, pp. 88-91.
The ‘Three Rams’ (san yang) design represents a change
of fortune with the arrival of Spring and the New Year. The
three rams are often shown together with the the rising sun
(taiyang) to form the rebus for ‘three yang bring prosperity’.
Yijing [Book of Changes] first mentions the phrase san yang
referring to the three male lines, called tai, that symbolise
heaven. The tai is positioned under three female lines called
kun that represent earth. Hence the phrase Sanyang kaitai
which means the New Year brings renewal and a change of
fortune.