Page 154 - March 17 2017 Chinese Art NYC, Christies

PROPERTY FROM A PRIVATE COLLECTION

1137
A GLAZED WHITE WARE KUNDIKA

TANG DYNASTY (AD 618-907)
The vessel is made in imitation of a metal prototype with
an ovoid body incised with a line on the shoulder, which is
interrupted by the bulbous spout, and with a raised band at the
base of the slender neck that rises to a stepped fange below
the tapered, conical mouth, all covered with a white slip under
a fnely crackled clear glaze of faint greenish-grey tone that
falls short of the spreading foot, exposing the fne white ware.
8¡ in. (21.3 cm.) high, wood stand, box
$10,000-15,000

PROVENANCE

T. Y. King & Sons, Ltd., 27 October 1986.
Bo Gyllensvärd discusses the origin of this form in ‘T’ang
Gold and Silver’, B.M.F.E.A., No. 29, Stockholm, 1957, p.
75, where he states that the holy water bottle of Buddhist
monks was considered a novelty by Yi Jing, the Chinese
Buddhist pilgrim who saw it in India in A.D. 671. The author
illustrates in line drawings, Figs. 35 and 36, Chinese bronze
and pottery examples alongside Central Asian and Indian
prototypes, including drawings of how they were used. See,
also, the metal kundika illustrated in Sui To no bijutsu, Osaka
Museum of Art, 1976, p. 33, no. 2-34; and the sancai-glazed
pottery example illustrated by Mizuno in Toujitaikei, No. 35,
Tousansai (Sancai), Heibonsha series, 1977, pl. 41.
唐 白釉淨瓶

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