Page 32 - Thornton Collection Chiense Ceramics HK Nov 2017

fig. 2 A bowl with red and white poppies, Yongzheng mark and period
© The Trustees of the British Museum.
enamel, but has also finely incised some of the petal veins, for an
even more delicate appearance and texture. The decorator has used
the incised veins particularly effective on the white, pink-tipped
poppies. The refined Yongzheng palette has also been used to its full
potential on the leaves, where shades of green blend from one tone
to another, while the tips of the leaves sometimes shade to either a
bluer tone or to a delicate yellow. The blossoms themselves were
clearly painted by an artist who was either very familiar with these
flowers, or was working with the actual flowers in front of him.
Each detail is naturalistically shown – from the stamens and carpels
in the centre of each blossom, to the typical slight angularity of the
stems and the distinctive way in which poppy buds open.
Poppies have numerous names in China, including yumeiren
(beautiful woman). One of the traditional names for poppies is
jinbeihua -literally ‘brocade quilt flower’, and as such it suggested
‘clothed in brocade’ - a reference to the fact that high officials wore purple iris beside a rock. This album leaf is illustrated in Harmony
brocade. Poppies were sometimes depicted accompanied by peonies
to suggest the wish ‘clothed in brocade and enjoying wealth and
honour’. Poppies were also a popular choice among painters on
silk and paper in the late 17th and early 18th century. Among the
ten album leaves in ink and colour on paper, entitled Flowers and
Plants by Yun Shouping (1633-1690), in the collection of the Palace
Museum, Beijing, and dated to AD 1685, is a leaf depicting red
poppies (illustrated by E. S. Rawski and J. Rawson (eds.) in China –
The Three Emperors 1662-1795, London, 2005, p. 330, no. 251). In the
collection of the National Palace Museum,Taipei, there are surviving
leaves from an album of flower paintings by Zou Yigui (1686-1772).
Leaf twelve from this album, which depicts chrysanthemums, bears
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an inscription which includes the date ‘fourth summer month of the
jiayin year of Yongzheng’, equivalent to AD 1734. Leaf eight in this
album depicts red, pink, purple and yellow poppies. The album leaf
is illustrated in Harmony and Integrity –TheYongzheng Emperor and His
Times, Taipei, 2009, p. 300, no. II-108. Interestingly, on this album
leaf Zou Yigui was at pains to indicate the delicate veins on the
petals and the fine hairs on the stems and buds, and was also careful
to indicate the slight angularity of some of the stems - features
which can also be seen in the painting on the current bowls.
Poppies were a theme embraced not only by Chinese artists, but also
by the European Jesuit artists at the Qing court. The most famous
of these, Giuseppe Castiglione (Lang Shining 1688-1766), painted
poppies on several occasions. Leaf number five from the album
Immortal Blossoms of an Eternal Spring, preserved in the collection
of the National Palace Museum, Taipei, depicts a red poppy and a
and Integrity –The Yongzheng Emperor and His Times, op. cit., p. 324, no.
II-118. Another leaf from the album, Immortal Blossoms of an Eternal
Spring, depicts red, pink, purple and yellow poppies with ragged petals.
In both depictions of poppies Castiglione, like Zou Yigui, emphasized
the slight angularity of the poppy stems and the pendant buds.
However, while the initial inspiration for the depiction of multi-
coloured poppies on these extremely rare bowls may have come
from paintings on silk or paper, the painting on porcelain was
innovative and exquisitely executed. The use of guozhihua on the
bowls, with its implicit complement to the emperor, has been
accomplished with consummate skill.