Page 323 - Important Chinese Art Sothebys March 2019

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A BLUE AND WHITE MING-STYLE ‘DRAGON’
MEIPING
QING DYNASTY, YONGZHENG PERIOD
sturdily potted, the sides rising at an angle to a broad,
generous shoulder rounding upward before converging at
the short waisted neck, painted in rich cobalt hues with a
pair of confronting five-clawed sinuous dragons vigorously
writhing amid flaming clouds above a turbulent sea,
the powerful bodies twisting and the muscular forelegs
outstretched, the vibrant cobalt of deep violet-tinged tone
and richly applied in areas imitating the ‘heaping and piling’
effect
height 10¾ in., 27.3 cm
Both in shape and design this vase appears to be closely
modeled on an early 15th century prototype. although no
early ming counterpart of identical design seems to be
preserved, a vase with a very similar bold dragon painted
has been recovered from the Yongle stratum of the waste
heaps of the ming Imperial kilns, published in the exhibition
catalogue Imperial Hongwu and Yongle Porcelain Excavated
at Jingdezhen, Chang Foundation, taipei, 1996, cat. no. 67;
and a meiping of similar form, painted with a blue dragon on
a white ground, Xuande mark and period, was included in
the exhibition Beauty and Tranquility: The Eli Lilly Collection
of Chinese Art, Indianapolis museum of art, Indianapolis,
1983, cat. no. 95. a similar design of an incised white dragon
on blue waves can be seen on the famous meiping from the
ardabil shrine, illustrated, for example, in takatoshi misugi,
Chinese Porcelain Collections in the Near East: Topkapi and
Ardebil, vol. 3, hong Kong, 1981, , pl. a 65, which also has
a broken counterpart discovered at the Imperial kiln site at
Jingdezhen, see the taipei exhibition, op.cit., cat. no. 67.
related examples with a Yongzheng reign mark include:
one with an incised white dragon on a ground of blue waves
illustrated in The Complete Collection of Treasures of the
Palace Museum, Blue and White Porcelain with Underglazed
Red (III), hong Kong, 2000, pl. 76; a bottle vase with an
underglaze-blue dragon striding amidst a foliate meander,
ibid., pl. 81; and a baluster-form vase with a pair of dragons
contesting a ‘flaming pearl’ over crashing waves, from the du
Boulay Collection, sold at Bonhams London, 10th november
2003, lot 32. see also an umarked meiping attributed to
the Yongzheng/Qianlong periods, with underglaze-blue and
copper-red decoration depicting dragons amid rolling waves,
from the Walter C. Koerner Collection sold at Christie’s
London, 4th June 1973, lot 107.

$ 60,000-80,000
清雍正 青花海水雲龍紋梅瓶

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