Page 200 - Bonhams Catalog Cohen and Cohen Jan 24, 2023 New York

(detail)

95
A FINE MASSIVE FAMILLE ROSE ‘MYNAH BIRD’ CHARGER The bird is most likely a mynah (ma mi niao), an Asian (and
Yongzheng/early Qianlong period, circa 1740 Australasian) starling that typically has dark plumage, gregarious
Brightly and delicately enameled in Yongzheng painterly taste across behavior, and a loud call. The crest at the beak of our example
the whole center of this unusually large charger with a large black and suggests it to be a Crested Mynah (Acridotheres cristatellus). It was
white bird perched on a flowering curling double branch of leafy tree for many generations kept as a caged bird in China, popular for its
peony issuing from a blue ‘scholar’s rock’ alongside more peonies and ability to mimic sounds, often repeating words in the same way as a
other vivid flowers, all beneath an unusually elaborate and colorful wide parrot in the West. Mynah birds have appeared in a number of Chinese
border of floral swags divided at the compass points by four blue and folk tales, including one as early the Han dynasty in which the bird
pink cloud-collar panels. belonging to an artist gains revenge upon a local magistrate for unfairly
22in (52cm) diam treating its master. In the Ming era they often symbolized freedom and
independence of thought. A painting by Bada Shanren (c.1626-1705)
$12,000 - 18,000 has the inscription: “The Myna bird understands the language of man
and does not care whether the wind blows or the sun shines.”
雍正/乾隆早期 約1740年 大件粉彩《喜鵲牡丹》紋盤
Given the very high quality and technical virtuosity of the painting
Published: on this charger, it seems very probable that this unusually large
Cohen & Cohen, Take Two!, Antwerp, 2017, pp. 66-67, no. 27 and handsome display dish must have been enameled in the same
workshop as Lot 22 in this sale.
出版：
倫敦Cohen & Cohen古董行，《Take Two!》，安特衛普，2017年，頁
66-67，圖版編號27

198 | BONHAMS