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Lot Essay
The Wen Tsan Yu Collection, consisting of important paintings and ceramics, was formed by a Beijing University professor who graduated from the University of Chicago in 1916 and from Harvard University in 1919.
The combination of gourds (gua) and butterflies (die) represent the wish for endless generations of sons and grandsons (guadie mianmian), a wish reinforced by the red seeds of the ripe gourds.
One of a pair of similar Qianlong-marked bowls in the Percival David Foundation is illustrated by Lady David in Illustrated Catalogue of Ch'ing Enamelled Ware, 1973, no. 897, the other (no. 898) in Oriental Ceramics, The World's Great Collections, vol. 6, Tokyo/San Francisco, 1982, no. 274. Another in the Musée Guimet, Paris, is illustrated in Oriental Ceramics, The World's Great Collections, vol. 7, 1981, col. pl. 91. See, also, the similar bowl sold at Christie's New York, 24-25 March 2011, lot 1703.
The combination of gourds (gua) and butterflies (die) represent the wish for endless generations of sons and grandsons (guadie mianmian), a wish reinforced by the red seeds of the ripe gourds.
One of a pair of similar Qianlong-marked bowls in the Percival David Foundation is illustrated by Lady David in Illustrated Catalogue of Ch'ing Enamelled Ware, 1973, no. 897, the other (no. 898) in Oriental Ceramics, The World's Great Collections, vol. 6, Tokyo/San Francisco, 1982, no. 274. Another in the Musée Guimet, Paris, is illustrated in Oriental Ceramics, The World's Great Collections, vol. 7, 1981, col. pl. 91. See, also, the similar bowl sold at Christie's New York, 24-25 March 2011, lot 1703.