Page 221 - 2021 March 16th Japanese and Korean Art, Christie's New York City

Used as storage vessels and occasionally as vases for
Joseon Dynasty, Seoul: National Museum of Korea, 2015,
monumental floral displays at banquets and ceremonies, p. 14, no. 3), reveals that by the late fifteenth-century
such large, broad-shouldered, narrow-waisted jars were the maebyeongvessel had evolved from slender-necked
popular in Korea from the seventeenth through the bottle into wide-mouthed jar; it further reveals that in the
nineteenth centuries. Some feature landscape decoration, transformation from bottle to jar, such vessels saw both an
while others boast dragons, tigers, haetae, or other favored increase in size and a change in proportions, the shoulder
beasts, and yet others sport floral designs or auspicious becoming ever broader, presumably to accommodate the
Chinese characters. Made in the eighteenth century, this wider mouth. As evinced by a porcelain jar embellished
jar features four blossoming plants, each growing from a with a branch of fruiting grapevine painted in underglaze
continuous, if minimally indicated, ground line, the plants iron brown, the jar now in the collection of Ewha Women’s
interspersed with roundels emblazoned with auspicious University Museum, Seoul (National Treasure no. 107),
Chinese characters reading from right to left (in Korean seventeenth-century potters gave the jar form the robust
pronunciation)su, bok, gang, and nyeong, which mean— interpretation that would continue through the end of the
and which offer wishes to the viewer for—longevity, good dynastic era. Unique to Korea, jars with bulging shoulders
fortune, good health, and peace. and gently curved side walls that descend to a constricted
base were ubiquitous during the seventeenth, eighteenth,
This jar’s form doubtless finds distant inspiration in
and nineteenth centuries. Formally termed junin Korean,
meipingvessels created in China during the Northern
this jar shape is sometimes also called a “moon jar”—dal
Song period (960–1127). Despite the poetic name meaning
hangari—though that name technically should be reserved
“plum vase,” meiping(Korean, maebyeong) vessels were
for large round jars whose globular shape recalls a full
not originally used as vases for the display of cut branches
moon.
of blossoming plum but were elegant storage bottles for
wine and other liquids. Korean potters of the twelfth and Seventeenth- and early eighteenth-century examples have
thirteenth centuries, during the Goryeo dynasty (918–1392), a short, vertical, collar-like neck and an exaggerated profile,
gave the maebyeongform its classic interpretation, with with massive shoulders and constricted waist; of closely
broad shoulders, narrow waist, and lightly flaring foot. related form, those from the second half of the eighteenth
century display a less exaggerated profile that incorporates
Crafted in both porcelain andbuncheongstoneware,
a gentle S-curve, and they have a slightly higher neck;
the maebyeongform persisted into the Joseon dynasty
that classic form continues into the first decades of the
(1392–1910), following its own evolutionary path. Dated
nineteenth century. Jars from later in the nineteenth
by inscription to 1489, a monumental Korean blue-and-
century, by contrast, exhibit a more mannered profile with
white porcelain jar with pine and bamboo décor in the
narrower shoulders, an attenuated body, a beveled foot,
collection of Dongguk University Museum, Seoul (National
and a tall, cylindrical neck.
Treasure no. 176; See: In Blue and White: Porcelain of the