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Lot Essay
This vase was made using one of the most difficult techniques attempted by the ceramic decorators of the Cizhou kilns. The technique involved covering the vessel with a pale slip, and after drying applying a dark slip over the top. Areas of the dark slip were then cut away leaving the decoration in dark brown against a pale ground. Details of the decoration were also cut through the dark slip, using a sharp point, to reveal the paler slip beneath. The vessel was then covered in a colourless transparent glaze and the piece fired. The decorator had to employ great skill and care in cutting the ground of the decoration away, since it was difficult not to cut too deeply and remove some of the pale slip along with the dark.
Several examples of meiping with similar decoration produced using this technique are known. The current example is unusual in that instead of the narrow S-form petal bands on the shoulder and foot seen on the majority of similar pieces, it has wide overlapping petals with incised central veins on the shoulder and wide overlapping petals with short combed texture around the foot. A similar wide overlapping petal band with incised central vein, appears however on the shoulder of a vase with comparable sgraffiato peony design in the collection of the Goto Art Museum, illustrated by G. Hasebe in Sekai Toji Zenshu, Song, vol. 12, Shogakukan, Tokyo, 1977, p. 125, no. 119.
A meiping in the collection of the Kyoto National Museum shares with the current example wide shoulders, which are less rounded than those of other vases. The Kyoto piece also shares with the current vase a similar arrangement of curving stems framing the large blossoms of the peony scroll. The Kyoto vase is illustrated in Sekai Toji Zenshu, vol. 10, Song and Liao, Kawade Shobo, Tokyo, 1955, pl. 94.
Vessels with this type of decoration depicting peony scrolls were made at the Guantai kilns in Ci county, Hebei province. A sherd found at these kilns is illustrated in Wenwu, 1964, no. 8, pl. 6:1. Other meiping with peony decoration produced using the same technique are in a number of important museum collections. One example, belonging to the collection of the former royal house of the Yi Dynasty in Seoul is illustrated in Chosen koseki zufu, Chosen Sotokufu, Seoul, 1926, 15 vols., p. 1128, pl. 3718. Another is in the Yamato Bunkakan, and is published in Chinese Ceramics from the Yamato Bunkakan Collection, Nara, 1977, no. 7. An example with wider main decorative band is in the British Museum, published by D. Barrett, et al., in The World's Great Collections, Oriental Ceramics, Vol. 5, the British Museum, London, Kodansha, Tokyo/New York/San Francisco, 1981, pl. 110, and a further vase from the Worcester Art Museum is illustrated by Y. Mino in Freedon of Clay and Brush through Seven Centuries in Northern China: Tz'u-chou Type Wares, 960-1600 A.D., Indianapolis, 1980, p. 102, pl. 39. An example with S-form narrow petal bands framing the poeny scroll was sold in New York in September 1999, lot 202. Compare also the jar illustrated in The Royal Ontario Museum The T.T. Tsui Galleries of Chinese Art, Toronto, 1996, fig. 91
Several examples of meiping with similar decoration produced using this technique are known. The current example is unusual in that instead of the narrow S-form petal bands on the shoulder and foot seen on the majority of similar pieces, it has wide overlapping petals with incised central veins on the shoulder and wide overlapping petals with short combed texture around the foot. A similar wide overlapping petal band with incised central vein, appears however on the shoulder of a vase with comparable sgraffiato peony design in the collection of the Goto Art Museum, illustrated by G. Hasebe in Sekai Toji Zenshu, Song, vol. 12, Shogakukan, Tokyo, 1977, p. 125, no. 119.
A meiping in the collection of the Kyoto National Museum shares with the current example wide shoulders, which are less rounded than those of other vases. The Kyoto piece also shares with the current vase a similar arrangement of curving stems framing the large blossoms of the peony scroll. The Kyoto vase is illustrated in Sekai Toji Zenshu, vol. 10, Song and Liao, Kawade Shobo, Tokyo, 1955, pl. 94.
Vessels with this type of decoration depicting peony scrolls were made at the Guantai kilns in Ci county, Hebei province. A sherd found at these kilns is illustrated in Wenwu, 1964, no. 8, pl. 6:1. Other meiping with peony decoration produced using the same technique are in a number of important museum collections. One example, belonging to the collection of the former royal house of the Yi Dynasty in Seoul is illustrated in Chosen koseki zufu, Chosen Sotokufu, Seoul, 1926, 15 vols., p. 1128, pl. 3718. Another is in the Yamato Bunkakan, and is published in Chinese Ceramics from the Yamato Bunkakan Collection, Nara, 1977, no. 7. An example with wider main decorative band is in the British Museum, published by D. Barrett, et al., in The World's Great Collections, Oriental Ceramics, Vol. 5, the British Museum, London, Kodansha, Tokyo/New York/San Francisco, 1981, pl. 110, and a further vase from the Worcester Art Museum is illustrated by Y. Mino in Freedon of Clay and Brush through Seven Centuries in Northern China: Tz'u-chou Type Wares, 960-1600 A.D., Indianapolis, 1980, p. 102, pl. 39. An example with S-form narrow petal bands framing the poeny scroll was sold in New York in September 1999, lot 202. Compare also the jar illustrated in The Royal Ontario Museum The T.T. Tsui Galleries of Chinese Art, Toronto, 1996, fig. 91