Page 114 - Christies Asia Week 2015 Chinese Works of Art

This exceptional tripod is painted on the interior with one of the most spectacular designs of any
imperial enamel-on-metal vessel. Essentially the wings of two confronted butterfies have been
elaborately decorated and spread to form a circular medallion of great complexity and beauty. The
wings of the insects have been reimagined by the artist so that the lower part of the wing on each
butterfy has been painted in futed shell-like form, while another part of each butterfy’s wing is
decorated with fower heads and vegetal scrolls. The enamel artist has used a richly varied palette to
create the design, as well as a range of brush strokes to produce intensities and textures ranging from
vibrant blocks of colour to shaded stippling which creates the impression of futed forms.

The rare use of elaborate butterfies to form decorative circular medallions on imperial enamels on
metal can be seen as early as the Kangxi reign on items such as the petal-lobed plate from the Qing
Court Collection in the Palace Museum, Beijing, on which the two butterfies are combined with
orchids and other fowers, illustrated in The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum
– 43 - Metal-bodied Enamel Ware, Hong Kong, 2002, p. 190, no. 181, although the Kangxi design is
not as complex and varied as that on the Qianlong tripod. A pair of elaborate butterfies can also be
seen on a small number of imperial enamel-on-metal vessels from the Yongzheng reign, such as those
on a small teapot from the Qing Court Collection in the Palace Museum, Beijing, illustrated in The
Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum – 43 - Metal-bodied Enamel Ware, op. cit., p.
195, no. 186 and the lobed plate in the collection of the National Palace Museum, Taipei, illustrated in
Enamel Ware in the Ming and Ch’ing Dynasties, Taipei, 1999, p. 200, no. 99. In neither of these cases,
however, have the butterfies’ wings been used to form a circular medallion, but instead have been
combined with fowers to produce a less formal design. Similar, less formal use of paired elaborate
butterfies with fowers can be seen on two small imperial Qianlong ewers – one in the collection of
the National Palace Museum, Taipei, illustrated in Enamel Ware in the Ming and Ch’ing Dynasties, op.
cit., p. 263, no. 142 and one in the collection of the Shenyang Imperial Palace Museum, illustrated
in The Prime Cultural Relics Collected by Shenyang Imperial Palace Museum, The Enamel Volume,
Shenyang, 2007, p. 60-1, no. 14. Clearly the Qianlong Emperor was particularly impressed with the
exquisite butterfy design on the current metal tripod, as an almost identical design can be seen on
a small Qianlong imperial porcelain dish in the collection of the National Palace Museum, Taipei,
illustrated in Special Exhibition of Ch’ing Dynasty Enamelled Porcelains of the Imperial Ateliers, Taipei,
1992, pp. 232-3, no. 117, and again in Shi Jingfei, Ri yue guang hua: Qing gong hua fa lang, Taipei,
2012, pl. 78. It is interesting to note that the porcelain dish has a richly gilded rim which may have
been intended to evoke the impression of gilt metal.

The current vessel has a particularly lovely and unusual four-character Qianlong mark, which is written
within a peach, which is part of a beautifully-painted cluster with a further peach, roses, lingzhi
fungus, and narcissi. The application of imperial marks within auspicious fruit can be seen in the
Yongzheng reign on two zhadou – one in the collection of the Palace Museum, Beijing, illustrated in
The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum – 43 - Metal-bodied Enamel Ware, op.
cit., p. 200, no. 1910 and one in the collection of the National Palace Museum, Taipei, illustrated in
Enamel Ware in the Ming and Ch’ing Dynasties, op. cit., pp. 206-7, no. 104, although neither of these
have the complexity of the mark on the current tripod. However, an almost identical mark with the
same arrangement of auspicious fruit and fowers appears on an imperial Qianlong perfumer in the
collection of the National Palace Museum, Taipei, illustrated in Enamel Ware in the Ming and Ch’ing
Dynasties, op. cit., pp. 250-1, no. 132. Interestingly, the mark on the Taipei vessel is set against a
turquoise background, rather than the white of the tripod base, and the four characters have been
placed at the cardinal points outside the group of fruit and fowers, rather than being written on the
large peach, as on the current vessel.

Rosemary Scott
International Academic Director, Asian Art

Fig. 1. A small dish with stylized décor of butterfies,
Qianlong mark and period (1736-1795), in the collection
of the National Palace Museum, Taipei, after Special
Exhibition of Ch’ing Dynasty Enamelled Porcelains of the

112 Imperial Ateliers, Taipei, 1992, pp. 232-3, no. 117.