KANGXI PERIOD (1662-1722)

Details

A FAMILLE VERTE VASE
KANGXI PERIOD (1662-1722)
Decorated with a scene of an official holding a fan sitting in a lakeside pavilion as he watches female equestrians performing acrobatic stunts atop their horses, with a gangplank extending from a dock to a boat with a striped awning sheltering a table and an attendant seated holding the tiller in the stern, all below a diaper border on the shoulder and various flowers growing around rocks on the neck, with an artemesia leaf mark within a double circle on the base
16½ in. (42 cm.) high

Provenance

Chait Galleries, New York.

Lot Essay

The unusual decoration on this vase may derive from the Yang Jia Jiang, or The Generals of the Yang Family, written by Yong Damu during the Ming dynasty. The story refers to the Yang family of the Song dynasty and the women from the family who trained for mounted combat against Liao invaders from Manchuria, after males of the family had been killed in earlier battles. For a large blue and white yenyen vase of Kangxi date that depicts the same theme see E. J. Sullivan, ed., The Taft Museum: Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art, New York, 1995, pp. 586-7, no. 1931.138, where the authors state that historical scenes of this type were used by the Kangxi emperor as propaganda to consolidate his power.

More from Fine Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art

View All