A RARE PORCELAIN AND HARDWOOD DECANTER BOX AND COVER

18TH CENTURY

Details

A RARE PORCELAIN AND HARDWOOD DECANTER BOX AND COVER
18TH CENTURY
The hinged cover and four sides each with porcelain panel painted in underglaze blue with a Chinese riverscape, the details picked out in colored enamels, including on the larger panels a tiny, pink-robed figure fishing, bail handles on the ends and the inside fitted with six wood-divided compartments holding six glass decanters, each with later Swedish silver-topped cork applied with a silver Chinese character
12 3/8 in. (31.4 cm.) wide overall (13)

Lot Essay

A Chinese box of very similar form with six glass decanters, but all of carved hardwood, is in the collection of the Victoria & Albert Museum, London, and illustrated by P. Conner in The China Trade, 1600-1860 (ex. cat.), no. 160. Compare also a Chinese blue and white porcelain box of this scale decorated with landscape and holding three Sheffield plate tea caddies that was sold Christie's New York, 23 January 2001, lot 14. The silver tops on the present example with marks for Stockholm 1906, maker Carl Gustaf Hallberg, suggesting that the box may have been a Swedish order that remained in Stockholm until at least that date, when replacement tops were ordered.

More from Chinese Export Art

View All