Page 265 - Bonhams Fine Chinese Art Nov 2013 London

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A bronze two-handled incense burner
Cast Xuande six-character mark, 17th century
The oval vessel of narcissus-bowl form with a flaring rim, raised on
four cloud-shaped feet enclosing a monster mask, flanked by two
handles with a single-horned dragon clambering up just over the rim.
26.9cm (10½in) wide
£5,000 - 8,000
HK$62,000 - 100,000 CNY49,000 - 79,000

十七世紀 銅雙龍耳四足爐 陽文「大明宣德年製」楷書款
See a related example in the Robert E. Kresko Collections, illustrated
by P.K.Hu, Later Chinese Bronzes: The Saint Louis Art Museum and
Robert E. Kresko Collections, Saint Louis, 2008, p.89, no.16. Also
compare an incense burner illustrated by P.Moss and G. Hawthorn,
The Second Bronze Age: Later Chinese Metalwork, London, 1991,
pl.43.

249
A bronze ‘lotus’ incense burner and cover
Cast Xuande six-character mark, 17th/18th century
The incense burner cast as a stylised ten-petalled lotus blossom
flanked by two bird’s-head handles, all raised on a straight foot
cast with stiff pendent lappets, the reticulated cover with a central
floral medallion forming the finial encircled by two striding dragons
breathing fire amid cloud scrolls.
13.6cm (5 3/8in) high (2).
£6,000 - 8,000
HK$75,000 - 100,000 CNY59,000 - 79,000

十七/十八世紀 銅蓮式蓋爐 陽文「大明宣德年製」楷書款 249
Bronzes such as the present lot are cast with a Xuande mark in
deliberate reference to the much-admired exceptional bronzes
produced during the reign of the Ming Emperor. A Xuande prototype
of the present lot dated by a 14-character inscription to 1430, also
of lotus form but with phoenix in flight on the reticulated cover,
is included in the collection at the Château de Fontainebleau
and illustrated by C.Samoyault-Verlet et al., Le Musée chinois de
l’impératrice Eugénie, Paris, 1994, p.44, fig.33.

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