Lot Essay
The scene on this vase appears to derive from a woodblock print. See Liu Jung-en, Six Yuan Plays, Penguin Classics, trans., 1972, p. 161, for a Chongzhen period print which originally appeared in The Collection of Willow Branches, illustrating the same episode from Zhang Boils the Sea, by Li Haogu, active in the early 13th century.
Three vases of this shape and size similarly painted with intimate figural scenes, also most likely derived from print sources, are illustrated by W.G. Gulland, Chinese Porcelain, vol. II, London, 1918, nos. 717, 718 and 719. See, also, S. Bushell, Oriental Ceramic Art, New York, 1980 ed., col. pl. XXI; and a vase in the Louvre, illustrated by Vasselot and Ballot, Chinese Ceramics, pl. 32.
Three vases of this shape and size similarly painted with intimate figural scenes, also most likely derived from print sources, are illustrated by W.G. Gulland, Chinese Porcelain, vol. II, London, 1918, nos. 717, 718 and 719. See, also, S. Bushell, Oriental Ceramic Art, New York, 1980 ed., col. pl. XXI; and a vase in the Louvre, illustrated by Vasselot and Ballot, Chinese Ceramics, pl. 32.