THE PROPERTY OF A CHINESE AMERICAN FAMILY
A RARE FLAMBE-GLAZED PEAR-SHAPED ARCHAISTIC VASE, HU

Details
A RARE FLAMBE-GLAZED PEAR-SHAPED ARCHAISTIC VASE, HU
YONGZHENG INCISED FOUR-CHARACTER SEALMARK AND OF THE PERIOD (1723-1735)

Sturdily potted with a full rounded body rising to a waisted, slightly flared cylindrical neck applied with a single bow string, flanked on each side with a mythical dragon handle, each suspending a mock circular ring, covered in a characteristically thick and bright purple glaze with turquoise streaks thinning to brown over the extremities and mouth rim, the base covered in a mottled mushroom-brown wash
8 1/8 in. (20.4 cm.) high, box

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Lot Essay

Few flambé-glazed vases of this form and design are known. The only two published examples appear to be a Yongzheng vase of near-identical form and size in the Palace Museum collection, illustrated in Qingdai yuyao ciqi bowuguan cang, Palace Museum collection of Chinese Ceramics in the Qing Dynasty: Official Ware of the Qing Dyansty, Beijing, 2005, pp. 306-307, no. 139 (fig.1); and another formerly in the N.H.P Huth and E.T. Chow collections and now in the Meiyintang collection, illustrated in Chinese Ceramics from the Meiyintang Collection, Vol. 2, London, 1994, p. 186, no. 834.

Compare with a guan-type Yongzheng-marked vase of the same form in the Palace Museum Collection, Beijing, illustrated in Kangxi, Yongzheng, Qianlong, Hong Kong, 1989, pp. 249, pl. 78 and another relief decorated example in a celadon glaze illustrated, ibid, p. 276, pl. 105.

Cf. other related flambé-glazed vases bearing Yongzheng marks, although none of this exact form, in the Palace Museum, Beijing, illustrated ibid, pp. 278-281, pls. 107-110. Two slightly larger flambé-glazed examples of related form but both with flattened taotie handles have been sold: the first from the Jingguantang collection, sold at Christie's, 3 November 1996, lot 564; the other sold at Christie's Hong Kong, 30 May 2006, lot 1366.

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