Page 66 - Christie's Fine Chinese Paintings March 19 2019 Auction

A Magnificent Xuande Bowl With

Fruiting Sprays

Rosemary Scott, Senior International Academic Consultant Asian Art

hen the great Qing dynasty imperial patron and collector Emperor fruiting sprays were alternated with fower sprays on the sides of bowls and
Qianlong (1736-95) wanted to bestow particular praise on dishes - as on the interior of a large Yongle bowl in the collection of the Palace
W porcelains made for his court, he compared them to those created Museum, Beijing (illustrated in The Complete Collection of Treasures of the
for the courts of the Ming dynasty Xuande and Chenghua Emperors in the Palace Museum, Blue and White Porcelain with Underglaze Red, Part I, op. cit.,
15th century. In his appreciation of porcelains from this period, Qianlong was p. 68, no. 65). The specifc fruit, like the fowers included in the designs on
following the tradition of Chinese connoisseurs, who, over the centuries, had these early 15th century porcelains, would have been chosen with care for the
recognised the blue and white porcelains of the Xuande reign (1426-35) and messages they conveyed.
the polychrome wares of the Chenghua reign (1465-87) as representing the
pinnacles of achievement in their respective felds. The current magnifcent The sprays on the Palace Museum meiping and bowls share with the six
blue and white Xuande bowl with its superb decoration of fruiting and fruiting sprays around the exterior of the current bowl the feature of a
fowering sprays provides excellent justifcation for the high regard in which naturalistic break at the end of the twig – as if each spray had been torn of the
Xuande blue and white porcelains were, and indeed are, held. branch, rather than cut. This naturalistic approach was a relatively new one
on early 15th century blue and white wares, and it is probable that this and the
The bowl is a fne example of the skill of the Xuande potters. This reign frequent depiction of both fowers and fruit on the same branch - also seen on
period was one of those rare eras when both thinly-potted and thickly-potted this bowl - were infuenced by the woodblock illustrations in materia medica
porcelain vessels were equally well made. This bowl was deliberately thickly – pharmaceutical literature dealing with plants for their medicinal properties.
potted, in order to give it weight and stability, but the walls of the bowl are so Although studies of plants were advanced enough in the Han dynasty for
evenly thrown and so well fnished that there is no appearance of heaviness specifc mention to be made of foreign plants being brought into China in
and the bowl has fred without warping. This is no mean feat when one records dating to about 128 BC, it was not until the Song and Jin dynasties
considers how much porcelain shrinks in the kiln. The underglaze painted that there was extensive publication on the subject of plants. Among the
decoration was also created with the utmost skill – using a medium-sized most important of these was a signifcant publication on pharmacology by
brush to create bold natural designs of fruiting sprays, which complement the Tang Shenwei 唐慎微 (1056-93), who was a doctor who came from a Sichuan
form of the bowl. family of physicians. Tang Shenwei studied assiduously and added his
own observations to the information that he was able to glean from earlier
Flowers – either fower heads or foral scrolls - had been a popular source publications. He combined this knowledge into the Zhenglei Bencao 證類本草,
of decorative motifs on ceramics since at least as early as the Tang dynasty. which even in the Song dynasty was produced in two editions – one of 30
However, the regular inclusion of fruit on the branch was a relatively recent juan 卷 and one of 32 juan. In 1108 the book was revised by Ai Cheng 艾晟, with
phenomenon in the early Ming. Melons, grapes and gourds had been included further later revisions by Cao Xiaozhong 曹孝忠 and Wang Jixian
among the scattered natural elements in the centre of large Yuan dynasty 王繼先. Although parts of the book were lost, in the Jin dynasty Zhang Cunhui
mid-14th century blue and white dishes, and on some facetted double-gourd 張存惠 combined the text with a work by Kou Zongshi 寇宗奭 and in 1189
vases, but depictions of other fruit on branch or stem were few on pre-Ming published the 30 juan book entitled: Chongxiu Zhenghe Jingshi Zhenglei
porcelains. Nevertheless, in the Yongle reign (1402-24) not only imperial blue Beiyong Bencao (重修政和經史證類備用本草 New Revision of the Classifed and
and white porcelains, but also those monochrome white wares with tianbai Consolidated Armamentarium Pharmacopoeia of the Zhenghe Reign). It was
甜白 glaze and anhua 暗花 incised designs were regularly decorated with this version of the work which was later incorporated into the famous imperial
fruiting sprays. Sprays of fruit on the branch became thereafter a very popular Qing dynasty collectanea Siku Quanshu 四庫全書. After the Song period,
decorative theme on both open and vertical forms among the fnest quality the subject was much studied with both new and revised publications being
imperial porcelains. They appear, for example, scattered within the main produced during the Ming and Qing dynasties - the Bencao Gangmu 本草綱目
decorative band on the famous blue and white lidded meiping in the Palace by Li Shizhen (1518-93 李時珍), the frst draft of which was completed in 1578,
Museum, Beijing (illustrated in The Complete Collection of Treasures of the being regarded as one of the most important works of the Ming period. This
Palace Museum, Blue and White Porcelain with Underglaze Red, Part I, Hong intense academic activity serves to illustrate the importance given to studies
Kong, 2000, p. 32), and on the exterior of a Xuande mark and period six-lobed of this kind and helps to explain why the illustrations contained within these
bowl in the same collection (illustrated ibid., p. 159, no. 151). A considerable publications should have had such far-reaching infuence.
variety of diferent fruits has been found on the shards of early 15th century
vessels excavated from the site of the Imperial kilns, and in some cases the

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