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Lot Essay
This jardinière, like the blue and white vase decorated with “Washing the Elephant” (lot 3569), also exhibits the link between designs on porcelain and published designs for ink cakes. A 1606 edition of the Cheng Shi Moyuan shows a female immortal with attendant observing the jade hare pounding the elixir by the Moon Palace of Chang E. (fig. 1) The depiction of the Moon Palace rising from clouds can be closely compared to that found on the present jardinière.
This jardinière is very rare; only one other of this shape and polychrome enamel palette, from the Butler Family Collection, appears to be published. The Butler Family example has been extensively published, most recently by Michael Butler and Wang Qingzheng in Seventeenth Century Jingdezhen Porcelain from the Shanghai Museum and the Butler Collection: Beauty’s Enchantment, London, 2006, p. 175, no. 53, as well as by Michael Butler, Julia B. Curtis and Stephen Little in Shunzhi Porcelain: Treasures from an Unknown Reign, 1644-1661, Alexandria, VA, 2002, p. 221, no. 75.
This jardinière is very rare; only one other of this shape and polychrome enamel palette, from the Butler Family Collection, appears to be published. The Butler Family example has been extensively published, most recently by Michael Butler and Wang Qingzheng in Seventeenth Century Jingdezhen Porcelain from the Shanghai Museum and the Butler Collection: Beauty’s Enchantment, London, 2006, p. 175, no. 53, as well as by Michael Butler, Julia B. Curtis and Stephen Little in Shunzhi Porcelain: Treasures from an Unknown Reign, 1644-1661, Alexandria, VA, 2002, p. 221, no. 75.