Page 76 - Sotheby's Asia Week March 2024 Chinee Art

170
A LARGE ‘MISE’ ‘YUE’ CELADON LOBED BOWL, 唐 / 五代 越窰青釉花式大盌
TANG / FIVE DYNASTIES
Diameter 8¼ in., 21 cm
‘Mise’ (‘secret color’) porcelains were produced at the Yue
kilns from the late Tang dynasty. The term was documented
in a stone tablet listing the inventory in the underground
chamber of the Famen Pagoda in Shanxi province, where it
noted that there were seven ‘mise’ porcelain bowls.
Other Yue-type bowls of this form found in museum
collections include one in the British Museum, London
illustrated in Stacey Pierson, Percival David Foundation of
Chinese Art: A Guide to the Collection, London, 2002, pl. 6;
another in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London in Rose
Kerr, Song Dynasty Ceramics, London, 2004, pls 8 and
8a, and one in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, illustrated
in Mary Tregear, Catalogue of Chinese Greenware in the
Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, 1976, pl. 200. Late Tang
dynasty related examples with less prominent quatrilobe
form were recovered from the Belitung wreck dated to 825-
850 and illustrated in Shipwrecked, Tang Treasures and
Monsoon Winds, ed. Regina Krahl, John Guy, Julian Raby,
Singapore, 2010, pls 251-253 where the authors note that
Yue stonewares were held in high regard during the late Tang
dynasty, rivaled only by Xing wares and that ‘quality control
was strict’ and therefore production limited, ibid. p. 69.
For other examples of Yue-type ‘mise’ porcelain at auction,
see a circular box and cover sold at Christie’s Hong Kong,
31st May 2017, lot 219.
⊖ $ 40,000-60,000

148 SOTHEBY’S COMPLETE CATALOGUING AVAILABLE AT SOTHEBYS.COM/N11410 149