Page 19 - Sotheby's October 3 2017 Three Masterpieces

fig. 3 fig. 4

Blue and white ‘makara’ jar, mark and period of Xuande Blue and white ‘makara’ jar, base, mark and period of Xuande
Qing court collection Qing court collection
© Collection of the Palace Museum, Beijing © Collection of the Palace Museum, Beijing

of Treasures of the Palace Museum. Blue and White Porcelain design but with remains of a Xuande reign mark, reconstructed
with Underglazed Red, Shanghai, 2000, vol. 1, pl. 100 (figs from sherds discovered at the Ming imperial kiln site at
3 and 4); another jar of this design in the National Museum Jingdezhen, illustrated in Gugong Bowuyuan yu Jingdezhen
of China, Beijing, is illustrated in Zhongguo Guojia Bowuguan taoci kaogu xin chengguo. Ming Qing yuyao ciqi/The New
guancang wenwu yanjiu congshu/Studies on the Collections Achievements on Ceramic Archaeology of the Palace Museum
of the National Museum of China. Ciqi juan: Mingdai [Porcelain and Jingdezhen. The Porcelain of Imperial Kiln in Ming and Qing
section: Ming dynasty], Shanghai, 2007, pl. 29; a third piece, Dynasties, Beijing, 2016, pl. 130.
with a later cover, from the collections of Wu Lai-hsi, Major
Lindsay F. Hay, Soame Jenyns and now in the Fitzwilliam Jars of this form do not seem to be known with matching
Museum, Cambridge, published in B.S. McElney, ‘The Foliated porcelain covers and may have been used together with covers
Dragon’, The Bulletin of the Oriental Ceramic Society of Hong of a different material. A set of a porcelain stem bowl with a
Kong, no. 1, 1975, p. 54, pl. 1, was sold twice in our London silver stand and a gold cover dated in accordance with 1437
rooms, 26th May 1937, lot 37, and 16th June 1939, lot 97; has come to light, for example, in the tomb of Prince Zhuang of
and the fourth, included in An Exhibition of Important Chinese Liang and his wife near Zhongxiang, Hubei province, see Liang
Ceramics from the Robert Chang Collection, Christie’s London, Zhu, ed., Liang Zhuang wang mu/Mausoleum of Prince Liang
1993, cat. no. 12, was sold at Christie’s London, 12th December Zhuangwang, Beijing, 2007, vol. I, pp. 76-80 and vol. II, pls 80
1988, lot 173. Another very similar unmarked jar was offered in and 86.
these rooms, 30th October 2000, lot 103.
Kui dragons, albeit of a somewhat different manifestation, also
For a variant of this design, unmarked and probably appear to have been employed to assure the water supply for
representing a Yongle predecessor, see a larger jar with the brush of the Xuande Emperor, who was a skilled painter
somewhat different kui dragons and different designs around and poet. The motif appears on two fragmentary water
neck and shoulder, sold in these rooms, 16th May 1989, lot 112. droppers recovered from the Ming imperial kiln sites, see
and illustrated in Sotheby’s Hong Kong – Twenty Years, 1973- Jingdezhen chutu Ming Xuande guanyao ciqi/Xuande Imperial
1993, Hong Kong, 1993, pl. 55; and Sotheby’s. Thirty Years in Porcelain excavated at Jingdezhen, Chang Foundation, Taipei,
Hong Kong, Hong Kong, 2003, pl. 211; and another jar of that 1998, cat. nos F5 and F6.

THREE MASTERPIECES FROM THE COLLECTION OF AN ENGLISH LADY 17