A RARE PAINTED ENAMEL SPITTOON AND COVER

18TH CENTURY

Details

A RARE PAINTED ENAMEL SPITTOON AND COVER
18TH CENTURY
Comprised of three sections: a bowl, a funnel and a cover: the bowl with sides tapering slightly up from the rounded edge of the base to the everted rim formed as eight petals, the sides, top of the rim and cover painted with butterflies hovering amidst various fruiting and flowering vines, while the underside of the rim is painted with four bats in flight amidst lotus scroll, the conical funnel which sits on the mouth rim of the bowl painted with flower sprigs below a border of twisted ribbon, all in famille rose colors on a stippled pale turquoise ground
5 9/16 in. (14.2 cm.) across

Lot Essay

Compare the painted enamel covered spittoon of this type, painted with butterflies amidst flower sprigs illustrated by Chuimei Ho and Bennet Bronson in the exhibition catalogue, Splendors of China's Forbidden City: The Glorious Reign of Emperor Qianlong, The Field Museum, Chicago, 2004, p. 261, no. 337, where the authors note that spittoons of this type barely survive outside the Palace. The decoration of butterflies amidst flowers signifies 'happy encounters', a popular theme in the Qing period. Another painted enamel example of shaped rectangular form shown with cover, funnel and inner container of conforming outline, in the Qing Court Collection, is illustrated in The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum - 43 - Metal-bodied Enamel Ware, 2002, pp. 230-1, no. 219.

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