Page 26 - Fine Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art II

PROPERTY FROM A PRIVATE SOUTH AMERICAN COLLECTION
2163
A RARE FAMILLE ROSE CELADON-GROUND ‘BUTTERFLIES
AND GOURD-VINE’ VASE
QIANLONG SIX-CHARACTER SEAL MARK IN IRON RED AND OF THE
PERIOD (1736-1795)

The tapering, high-shouldered body and slender neck are
fnely enameled with a continuous, dense design of butterfies
fitting amidst fruiting and fowering gourd vines, all on a
celadon ground between borders of petal lappets below and
ruyi heads at the fared mouth rim above. The interior is
covered in turquoise enamel, as is the base surrounding the
reign mark.
15 in. (38 cm.) high

$200,000-300,000

PROVENANCE:

Acquired in Paris in the 1880s, and thence by descent within
the family.

The auspicious decoration of butterfies combined with fruiting
gourd vines found on this vase forms the rebus guadie mianmian,
‘May you have ceaseless generations of descendants’.
The same combination of butterfies and fruiting gourd vine
decoration in famille rose enamels on a celadon ground is also seen
on a larger vase (53.5 cm.) of a different shape with gilt dragon
handles, and a gilt Qianlong seal mark, illustrated in Chugoku
meitou ten (An Exhibition of Noted Chinese Ceramics), Japan, 1992,
no. 143, and possibly the same vase that was sold at Christie’s
London, 6 June 1988, lot 103. (Fig. 1) On the present vase, most
likely due to its slender shape, the decoration is more densely
arranged than on the larger vase, but both the present vase and the
larger vase or vases have a similar ruyi border just below the mouth
rim, and the fne quality of the enamel decoration is also similar.

清乾隆 梅青地粉彩「瓜瓞綿綿」瓶
礬紅六字篆書款

(mark)

Fig. 1. A famille rose celadon-ground
‘butterfies and gourd-vine’ vase, Qianlong
seal mark and of the period (1736-1795).
Sold at Christie’s London, 6 June 1988, lot

24 103.