QIANLONG SEAL MARK IN UNDERGLAZE BLUE AND OF THE PERIOD (1736-1795)

This pair of exquisite bowls belongs to a small and rare group of porcelains covered on the exterior with an enamel of saturated deep ruby tone. The color—developed at Jingdezhen in the late Kangxi period—marked a significant expansion of the imperial enamel palette. Achieved through ground ruby-colored glass with reduced proportions of colloidal gold and tin, the enamel could be fired to a more stable, even surface than many contemporary European ruby enamels, which were prone to mottling and irregularity in the color tones.

Although bowls of this type are well known in the Yongzheng reign, Qianlong mark-and-period examples are notably less common. A closely related Qianlong-period covered bowl from the Zhuyuetang Collection was exhibited in Shimmering Colours. Monochromes of the Yuan to Qing Periods: the Zhuyuetang Collection, Art Museum, Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2005, cat. no. 51. Another comparable Qianlong-period example was sold at Christie’s Hong Kong, 1 June 2011, lot 3539, and a slightly larger pair sold at Sotheby’s Hong Kong, 2 May 2005, lot 684. For the Yongzheng prototype, compare a mark-and-period bowl covered in a similarly rich ruby enamel, included in a travelling exhibition organized by the National Museum of History, Taipei, and published in Zhongguo ming tao Riben xunhui zhan [Traveling exhibition in Japan of famous Chinese ceramics], Taipei, 1993, p. 177. Another comparable Yongzheng example was sold at Sotheby’s Hong Kong, 31 October 1995, lot 415, and again 29 October 2001, lot 577.