Page 172 - Fine Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art II

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A RARE LONGQUAN CELADON ‘KINUTA’ MEIPING
SOUTHERN SONG-YUAN DYNASTY, 12TH-13TH CENTURY

The bottle has a slender tapering body surmounted by a small cylindrical neck with rounded
rim, and is covered allover in an even glaze of slightly bluish, sea-green color which falls in a
line to just above the unglazed foot rim.
9º in. (23.6 cm.) high, Japanese silk brocade pouch, Japanese wood box and inner black
lacquer box

$300,000-500,000

PROVENANCE:

Mōri Family Collection, Japan.

Many of the labels affixed to the wood box for the current vase represent certificates of
periodic storage inspections conducted as early as 1818. A small accompanying wood tablet
describes the vase as a ‘Kinuta’ celadon vase belonging to the Mōri Family Collection.

While many different vase shapes were made at the Longquan kilns during the Song and
Yuan dynasties, the meiping form is remarkably rare prior to the Ming dynasty. The current
Longquan meiping not only belongs to the rare early group, but is one of the finest surviving
examples. Its glaze has the pure colour and soft translucence, which has been so admired by
collectors and connoisseurs in China and Japan for more than 700 years, while its shape has
been well potted and displays an attenuated elegance.

The neck of this meiping is of distinctive form, being slightly longer and more columnar than
the necks seen on later examples. It may be compared with the necks of two Song dynasty
Longquan meiping with carved and incised decoration. One of these is in the collection of the
Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, and is illustrated by G. Hasebe in Sekai Toji Zenshu – 12 – Song,
Tokyo, 1977, p. 198, no. 179. The other was excavated in 1977 from a Northern Song context
at Songyangxian in Zhejiang province, and is illustrated by Zhu Boqian in Celadons from
Longquan Kilns, Taipei, 1998, p. 108, no. 69. However, neither of these published vases has
the elegant tapering from shoulder to foot that can be seen on the current vase. A Longquan
meiping which is closer in profile to the current vessel is the undecorated, lidded vase which
was excavated in 1960 from a Southern Song tomb in Longquanxian and included in the
exhibition Green Wares from Zhejiang, Fung Ping Shan Museum, Hong Kong, 1993, no. 55.
Two Yuan dynasty Longquan celadon meiping recovered from the cargo of the Sinan wreck
are published in Xinan haidi wenwu, Seoul, 1977, pls. 40 and 41. Both of these vases have
strongly tapering sides, however they have wider, more sloping shoulders than the current
vessel.

Japanese connoisseurs have treasured fne Longquan celadon wares since they frst began to be
imported into Japan in the Southern Song period. It is therefore appropriate that this vase has been
in the collection of one of Japan’s most historically important families – the Mōri Family 毛利氏. This
powerful clan can trace its origins to the nobleman Oe no Hiromoto (大江広元 AD 1148-1225), who
was instrumental in establishing the structure of the Kamakura Shogunate. Oe no Hiromoto’s fourth
son founded the Mōri clan. The power of the Mōri family was at its height towards the end of the
Muromachi period (1392-1573), when they controlled western Honshu. In 1589, Mōri Terumoto
毛利輝元 instigated the building of Hiroshima Castle as a stronghold from which to govern the
nine provinces under the family’s rule. In time, the area of their lands was reduced to modern day
Yamaguchi Prefecture, and their new capital at Hagi City became an important centre for cultural
activities. Even after the ending of samurai rule in 1868 the family remained both powerful and
infuential. Today the Mōri Hontei Villa, with its beautiful gardens, is the setting for a museum
devoted to the family collection.

Rosemary Scott
International Academic Director, Asian Art

南宋/元 龍泉窯青釉梅瓶

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