Page 13 - Tabor Collection Christie's New York April 10 2019

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A FAMILLE ROSE HONG BOWL
QIANLONG PERIOD, CIRCA 1785
Enameled around the exterior with the foreign factories, or "hongs", along
the Canton waterfront, small Western fgures seen strolling in the courtyards
or conversing on balconies and junks plying the purple water, fags of Spain,
Sweden, Great Britain, the Netherlands and Denmark fying, the Dutch folly
fort rounding out the scene, the interior painted with a basket of fowers
12¼ in. (31.1 cm.) diameter
$40,000-60,000
PROVENANCE:
With Rodrigo Rivera Lake, Mexico City.
LITERATURE:
William R. Sargent, Chinese Porcelain in the Conde Collection, Madrid, 2014, p. .
278-279, no. 114.
The iconic 'hong' punchbowls, with their lively depictions of the Canton
waterfront buzzing with the activity of Chinese and foreigners alike, must
have been among the most extraordinary souvenirs available to Western
visitors in the China trade period. Depictions of the hongs appear on
porcelain from about 1765; at frst showing the scene in two large panels.
Continuous views like we see on this example seem to date from about 1780. 0.
Kee Il Choi has written of the conundrum of the Chinese artist who needed
to transfer an essentially rectangular landscape image onto a circular bowl,
pointing out that one solution, as we see here, was to insert the Dutch folly
fort in the water at the start and fnish of the waterfront.
Compare with a 'hong' bowl of similar size and composition in the collection
of Benjamin F. Edwards III, sold Christie's New York, 26 January 2010, lot 51.

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