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Lot Essay
The brush washer is potted with eight lobes, each in the shape of a mallow petal, flaring from a slightly recessed base with six spur marks, covered overall with a thick greyish-blue glaze suffused with a dense network of russet crackles thinning on the mouth rim.
Following the fall of the Northern Song dynasty in 1127, the Song court relocated to Lin’an (modern Hangzhou), marking the beginning of the Southern Song dynasty. To maintain the legitimacy of their rule, the Southern Song government reestablished many of the institutions inherited from the Northern Song court. As part of this effort, the Southern Song imperial kilns were set up in Hangzhou in the fourteenth year of the Shaoxing reign (1144).
Two kiln sites producing Guan (official) wares are mentioned in the texts. One of these is the Jiaotanxia (Beneath the Sacrificial Altar) kiln, which was located by archaeologists on Wuguishan (Turtle Hill) in the suburbs of Hangzhou in the 1930s. However, an earlier kiln is mentioned in literature, and has traditionally been credited with the finest Guan ware: this is the Xiuneisi (The Palace Maintenance Office) kiln, which most scholars today believe is the kiln site discovered near Fenghuang Hill in Hangzhou in 1996 — commonly referred to as the Laohudong Kiln.
The form and spur marks of the present washer closely resemble to those of a fragmentary eight-lobed washer unearthed at the Laohudong kiln site. See Hangzhou Laohudong yaozhi ciqi jingxuan, Beijing, 2002, p. 155, no. 123, suggesting that the present washer was likely produced at the same site.
Several Guan mallow-form washers are preserved in the Qing court collection, which are found with six-, eight, nine-, ten-, or sixteen-lobed rims, with the eight-lobed form being the most popular. See two Guan eight-lobed washers in the National Palace Museum, Taipei, Guci008673N000000000 (12 cm. diam.), and Guci017456N000000000 (12.4 cm. diam.), both with six spur marks on the base; and a Guan ten-lobed washer, Guci017145N000000000 (fig.2), also with six spur marks, that shares a very similar pattern pf crackles and glaze colour to the present washer. Compare also with a smaller Guan eight-lobed washer (9.9 cm. diam.) with similar crackles and glaze in the Percival David Foundation at the British Museum (PDF30), which only has five spur marks on the base, perhaps due to its smaller size.
It is extremely rare to find a Guan washer in private hands. A similar Guan ten-lobed washer from the collections of Sir Harry and Lady Garner, then Dr Mortimer D. Sackler was sold at Christie’s Hong Kong, Classical Chinese Art from the Sui to the Song Dynasties, 1 June 2016, lot 3126 (fig.3).
Following the fall of the Northern Song dynasty in 1127, the Song court relocated to Lin’an (modern Hangzhou), marking the beginning of the Southern Song dynasty. To maintain the legitimacy of their rule, the Southern Song government reestablished many of the institutions inherited from the Northern Song court. As part of this effort, the Southern Song imperial kilns were set up in Hangzhou in the fourteenth year of the Shaoxing reign (1144).
Two kiln sites producing Guan (official) wares are mentioned in the texts. One of these is the Jiaotanxia (Beneath the Sacrificial Altar) kiln, which was located by archaeologists on Wuguishan (Turtle Hill) in the suburbs of Hangzhou in the 1930s. However, an earlier kiln is mentioned in literature, and has traditionally been credited with the finest Guan ware: this is the Xiuneisi (The Palace Maintenance Office) kiln, which most scholars today believe is the kiln site discovered near Fenghuang Hill in Hangzhou in 1996 — commonly referred to as the Laohudong Kiln.
The form and spur marks of the present washer closely resemble to those of a fragmentary eight-lobed washer unearthed at the Laohudong kiln site. See Hangzhou Laohudong yaozhi ciqi jingxuan, Beijing, 2002, p. 155, no. 123, suggesting that the present washer was likely produced at the same site.
Several Guan mallow-form washers are preserved in the Qing court collection, which are found with six-, eight, nine-, ten-, or sixteen-lobed rims, with the eight-lobed form being the most popular. See two Guan eight-lobed washers in the National Palace Museum, Taipei, Guci008673N000000000 (12 cm. diam.), and Guci017456N000000000 (12.4 cm. diam.), both with six spur marks on the base; and a Guan ten-lobed washer, Guci017145N000000000 (fig.2), also with six spur marks, that shares a very similar pattern pf crackles and glaze colour to the present washer. Compare also with a smaller Guan eight-lobed washer (9.9 cm. diam.) with similar crackles and glaze in the Percival David Foundation at the British Museum (PDF30), which only has five spur marks on the base, perhaps due to its smaller size.
It is extremely rare to find a Guan washer in private hands. A similar Guan ten-lobed washer from the collections of Sir Harry and Lady Garner, then Dr Mortimer D. Sackler was sold at Christie’s Hong Kong, Classical Chinese Art from the Sui to the Song Dynasties, 1 June 2016, lot 3126 (fig.3).