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Lot Essay
This vase is very unusual in bearing a cyclical date. The text on this vase is the 'Later Ode to the Red Cliff' composed in 1082 by Su Shi (1036-1101). There is an added poem at the end of the text composed by the inscriber, Li Wenhuan, with a dedication to a certain Mr. Ziduan by the younger contemporary. A beaker vase also inscribed with the 'Later Ode to the Red Cliff' in the Palace Museum, Beijing, is illustrated in The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum - 36 - Blue and White Porcelain with Underglazed Red (III), Hong Kong, 2000, no. 32. A more common example is of tapering square shape, and inscribed on two sides with both the 'Former' and the 'Later Ode to the Red Cliff', such as the one in the Shanghai Museum, illustrated in Kangxi Porcelain Ware from the Shanghai Museum Collection, Hong Kong, 1998, p. 42, no. 31.
Three other examples of massive yenyen vases with landscape designs include one formerly from the Eugene O. Perkins collection, measuring 30¾ in. (78.1 cm.) high, sold in these rooms, 2 June 1989, lot 48; one illustrated by A. du Boulay, Christie's Pictorial History of Chinese Ceramics, New Jersey, 1984, p. 197 (no. 9); and another in the Palace Museum, Beijing, illustrated in Qing Shunzhi Kangxi chao qinghuaci (Selected Chinese Ceramics from the Palace Museum (vol. 1): Blue and White Ceramics in Shunzhi and Kangxi Periods), Beijing, 2005, p. 480, no. 310.
Three other examples of massive yenyen vases with landscape designs include one formerly from the Eugene O. Perkins collection, measuring 30¾ in. (78.1 cm.) high, sold in these rooms, 2 June 1989, lot 48; one illustrated by A. du Boulay, Christie's Pictorial History of Chinese Ceramics, New Jersey, 1984, p. 197 (no. 9); and another in the Palace Museum, Beijing, illustrated in Qing Shunzhi Kangxi chao qinghuaci (Selected Chinese Ceramics from the Palace Museum (vol. 1): Blue and White Ceramics in Shunzhi and Kangxi Periods), Beijing, 2005, p. 480, no. 310.