MING DYNASTY, EARLY 17TH CENTURY, IMPRESSED HE CHAOZONG MARK WITHIN A DOUBLE GOURD

Unlike the factories at Jingdezhen, porcelain production at Dehua was not under Imperial supervision; reign marks were therefore rarely used, and instead potters sometimes impressed their own seals or workshops marks. Some of these marked pieces have come to enjoy great prestige among collectors, most notably the works of He Chaozong. His Guanyin figures are graceful and serene, often with finely detailed attributes or seated on elaborately hollowed rockwork, and covered with a characteristic creamy rich glaze. Despite his renown, little is known about the potter, but modern scholarship now considers a late Ming dynasty/17th century date to be most likely.

A related He Chaozong-marked figure of Guanyin holding a scroll, and seated on a reed mat, without the cowl covering the hair, is illustrated by J. Ayers, Blanc de Chine: Divine Images in Porcelain, New York, 2002, inside cover and p. 83, no. 34. Another figure with both hands hidden within the folds of her long sleeves, also with a He Chaozong mark within a double-gourd, is illustrated by R. Blumenfield, Blanc de Chine: The Great Porcelain of Dehua, Hong Kong, 2002, p. 132, fig. A. Further related examples include one illustrated by P. J. Donnelly, Blanc de Chine: The Porcelain of Tehua in Fukien, New York, 1969, pl. 143, fig. B, and the unmarked figure holding a scroll, dated to the late 17th-early 18th century, illustrated by C. J. A. Jörg, Chinese Ceramics in the Collection of the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam: The Ming and Qing Dynasties, London, 1997, p. 244, no. 280.