Page 246 - March 17 2017 Chinese Art NYC, Christies

PROPERTY FROM THE ESTATE OF OGDEN MILLS PHIPPS
1237
A VERY RARE FAMILLE ROSE ‘HUNDRED DEER’ VASE
QIANLONG PERIOD (1736-1795)
The hu-form vase is fnely decorated in delicate enamels with a continuous
scene of bucks, does and fawns amidst rocks and trees, and with mountains
in the distance. A wide river shown as a large expanse of white separates
the scene, and the deer in the foreground on the near shore are depicted as
larger in size than those in the distance on the far shore creating an unusual
sense of perspective. The shoulders are set with a pair of stylized dragon
handles decorated in iron-red and gilt and the interior of the neck is covered
with turquoise enamel below the gilded rim. The base is drilled and has the
remnants of a Qianlong six-character seal mark in underglaze blue.
17Ω in. (44.5 cm.) high
$300,000-500,000
PROVENANCE
Acquired prior to 1970.
清乾隆 粉彩百鹿尊
Prosperity and Longevity – A Magnifcent Qianlong ‘Deer’ Vase
Rosemary Scott
International Academic Director, Asian Art
Magnifcent famille rose ‘deer’ vases such as the one in the current sale are
not only spectacular in their own right, but refect the taste of one of China’s
greatest imperial collectors and patrons, the Qianlong Emperor (1736-95),
and would have been made for his court at the imperial kilns of Jingdezhen.
While the whole of the bold pear-shape of their bodies is given over to
depiction of deer in landscape with rocks, pine trees and blossoming trees,
the scheme is complemented by the handles on either side, which are in the
form of archaistic dragons and are enamelled in iron red with gold details.
Such archaistic details were very popular at the Qianlong court.
Vases with this type of decoration are often known as ‘hundred deer vases’
- although in most cases the number ‘hundred’ is used loosely simply to
mean ‘many’. In Chinese a hundred deer is 百鹿 bai lu which suggests the
wish shoutian bailu 受天百祿 ‘May you receive the hundred emoluments from
heaven’ with the implication of a multiplied wish for wealth and rank, as well
as longevity. The number one hundred is implied using two other rebuses
within these designs, one is by including white deer amongst the brown or
red deer, since the word for white in Chinese is bai 白- a homophone for the
word for a hundred. The other rebus is provided by the inclusion of a cypress
tree in the design, since the name for cypress in Chinese is also bai 柏.
244
Indeed, deer have a number of auspicious meanings in Chinese culture.
Shoulao, the Star God of Longevity, is usually depicted accompanied by
a spotted deer, crane, peach and pine tree. Thus each of these, including
the deer, has come to represent long life. Deer are known to live for a long
time and are believed to be the only animals that can fnd the fungus of
immortality. In addition, deer may represent Luxing 祿星, the God of Rank
and Emolument. The Chinese word for deer, lu 鹿,sounds like lu 祿, the word
for emolument or an oficial salary, thus deer are symbolic of the rank and
wealth that are associated with such a salary. The deer on this vase are
shown in association with cypress trees. While the word for cypress bai
(or bo) 柏 can provide a rebus for ‘a hundred’, the deer and cypress together
can also suggest the wish bailing shilu 百齡食祿 ‘May you attain old age
and continue to receive emolument’. Finally, Chinese herbalists traditionally
grind up deer antlers and include the resulting powder in certain medicines,
believing it to have health-giving efects.
Two slightly diferent versions of this design exist. The version seen on the
current vases is the much rarer type, on which the river is a more dominant
feature of the landscape, and the artist has given greater attention to the
creation of coherent recession in the scheme. On the deer vases bearing
this version of the design the artist has used the river very efectively to
evoke a greater feeling of space in the composition, and allow a more
efective creation of recession in the landscape. This feeling of recession is
also emphasized by the device of painting the deer in the foreground on a
relatively large scale, and those deer across the river, in the distance, on a
much smaller scale. Compare two other vases of this type, also with iron red
and gilt handles, and the same lay-out: one in the collection of the National
Museum of China and illustrated in Zhongguo guojia bowuguan guancang
wenwu yanjiu congshu - ciqi juan - Qing dai, Shanghai, 2007, pp. 134-5, no.
90, and another from the Chang Foundation, illustrated in Selected Chinese
Ceramics from Han to Qing Dynasties, Taipei, 1990, pp. 368-9, no. 165.
The majority of published examples of Qianlong ‘hundred deer’ vases have
a more crowded scheme, without the wide river, with all of the deer painted
approximately the same size, and none viewed in the far distance. A ‘hundred
deer’ vase of this second type, from the Qing Court Collection, with iron
red handles similar to those on the current vases is in the collection of the
Palace Museum, Beijing (illustrated in The Complete Collection of Treasures
of the Palace Museum - 39 - Porcelains with Cloisonné Enamel Decoration
and Famille Rose Decoration, Commercial Press, Hong Kong, 1999, pp 98-9,
no. 85). A pair of similar ‘hundred deer’ vases with iron red handles is in the
Shanghai Museum (illustrated in Selected Ceramics from the Collection of
Mr. and Mrs. J.M. Hu, Shanghai, 1989, pl. 67), while a single example, also in
the Shanghai Museum, is illustrated in Chogoku Toji Zenshu, vol. 21, Kyoto,
1981, pl. 103. A further red-handled vase is in the Osaka Museum (illustrated
in Ming and Qing Ceramics and Works of Art, Japan, 1980, p. 43, pl. 195),
A similar vase was included in the Hong Kong Museum of Art exhibition
The Wonders of the Potter’s Palette, 1984, and is illustrated in the catalogue
as no. 71, while another from the Grandidier Collection is in the Musée
Guimet, Paris (illustrated in Oriental Ceramics, The World’s Great Collections,
Kodansha Series, Tokyo, 1981, vol. 7, pl. 190). A Qianlong ‘hundred deer’
vase with blue handles and a deer vase without handles are in the collection
of the Seikado Bunko Art Museum (illustrated in Qing Dynasty Porcelain,
Seikado Bunko Art Museum, Tokyo, 2006, p. 68, no. 58 and p. 69, no. 59,
respectively). A further ‘hundred deer’ vase with blue handles is in the
collection of the Nanjing Museum (illustrated in Qing Imperial Porcelain of the
Kangxi, Yongzheng and Qianlong Reigns, Nanjing Museum/Art Gallery of the
Chinese University of Hong Kong, 1995, no. 86).