Page 242 - J.J. Lally Chinese Art CHRISTIE'S March 23 2023 NYC

(another view)

Professor Peter H. Plesch (1918-2013) and his wife Gerta Regina couple went on to collect Asian art in a wide range of materials,
“Traudi” Plesch OBE (1921-2013) were avid collectors of Chinese, from Song dynasty ceramics to Japanese sword-fittings, netsuke
Japanese and Korean art. The first antique purchased by Peter, and wood-block prints, and from Korean celadons to Qing dynasty
while he was a student at Cambridge University, was a Chinese glass. Peter became known as a serious collector when he purchased
th
19 -century silver hip flask, which he used throughout World a Ru narcissus bowl in March 1959 at Sotheby’s for £2,200 against
War II. However, his career as a real collector started much later, the dealer J.T. Tai. The bowl was later sold in February 1970 for
when in 1957 he inherited the very varied Chinese artifacts of his £46,000, a record for a Chinese ceramic at the time.
parents, and he realized that he knew very little about them. Peter
quickly sought knowledgeable advice and found it at the Grosvenor For a similar jade peach box and cover of smaller size also
House Antiques Fair of 1958 where he met Adrian Maynard of carved from a single jade boulder and connected by interlocking
Spink's Chinese Department, who became a trusted adviser branches, in the collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum,
and friend. London, see M. Wilson, Chinese Jades, London, 2004, pp. 56-57,
no. 58. See, also, a smaller jade box and cover in the form of a
The present jade peach box and cover is known to be Peter's first bitter melon, connected by a loose ring, illustrated in The Arts of
purchase of Chinese jade. After Peter and Traudi's marriage in the Ch’ing Dynasty, Oriental Ceramic Society, London, 1964,
1963 jade was to become one of her favorite collecting areas. The pl. 127, no. 393.

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