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PROPERTY FROM AN IMPORTANT JAPANESE This amboyant ewer encapsulates the A ewer of similar form, but with a variation of
PRIVATE COLLECTION international spirit and the opulent atmosphere oral appliques, was included in the exhibition
at the Chinese court in the rst half of the Tang
A RARE SANCAI-GLAZED POTTERY dynasty (618-907), which saw an unprecedented Sui Tō no bijutsu [Arts of the Sui and Tang
EWER rise in the ingenuity and skills of the country’s Dynasties], Osaka Municipal Museum of Art,
TANG DYNASTY artisans who strove to meet the rising demands Osaka, 1978, cat. no. 91; another, covered almost
of an a uent and discerning aristocracy. With the entirely in a blue glaze, in the Fuji Art Museum,
superbly potted, the ovoid body rising from a tall increased commercial and cultural exchange with Tokyo, is illustrated in Sekai tōji zenshu / Ceramic
splayed foot to a double-waisted neck, all below Western Asia through the Silk Road, Chang’an Art of the World, Tokyo, 1976, vol. 11, pl. 39; a
a wide pinched mouth attached to the shoulder emerged as an international metropolis par third, of more globular shape, from the collection
by an arched double-strap handle with a tabbed excellence. Its sizable communities of foreign of George Eumorfopoulos and now in the British
thumb-piece, the body with three horizontal residents from across Asia allowed craftsmen to Museum, London, is published in R.L. Hobson and
bands of grooved circles, applied with crisply come into contact with an abundance of styles A.L. Hetherington, The Art of the Chinese Potter,
molded oral crests and stylized palmettes, all and techniques, which they quickly synthesized in London, 1923, pl. XV; and two further examples
beneath splashed straw, green and amber glazes, creating the aesthetic trends of the period. are illustrated in Masterpieces of Chinese and
stopping unevenly to reveal the bu body at the Korean Ceramics in the Ataka Collection, Tokyo,
base, Japanese wood box (3) The present piece, although unique, belongs 1980, pls 48 and 49.
Height 11⅜ in., 29 cm to an extremely small group of ewers modeled
with a pinched mouth and decorated with Compare also a sancai censer decorated
PROVENANCE with similar applique, included in The Special
Acquired in Japan in the 1960s (by repute). oral appliques. The application of these sprig- Exhibition of Tang Tri-Colour, National Museum
molded reliefs, which evokes the encrustation of of History, Taipei, 1995, cat. no. 80; and another
$ 120,000-180,000 precious metal objects with jewels and pearls, from the collection of Howard C. Hollis, included
were widely used in the Northern Qi period, and in the exhibition The Arts of the T’ang Dynasty,
1960 their popularity continued into the Tang dynasty, Los Angeles County Museum, Los Angeles, 1957,
when fanciful oral and foliate palmette motifs cat. no. 197.
appeared in a multitude of myriad versions on
artifacts of various media, including textiles,
silver and ceramics.
106 SOTHEBY’S
