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Lot Essay
Located at Huangpuzhen, Tongchuanxian, Shaanxi province, the Yaozhou kilns began production of a wide range of wares during the Tang dynasty. The kilns were well placed to use water transportation to the Northern Song capital at Kaifeng, and it is recorded that Yaozhou wares were presented as tribute to the Northern Song court. Both the official Song history and other literary sources mention such tribute gifts. For instance, the official gazetteer during the Yuanfeng era (1078-1085), Yuanfeng jiuyu zhi, mentions fifty sets of tribute ceramics sent to the court from Yaozhou.
The present bowl, with its attractive pale sea-green glaze, is a classic example of fine Yaozhou ware. A Yaozhou bowl of this shape with a similar pattern of two hibiscus blossoms paired with its distinctive star-shaped leaf, is in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and illustrated in Oriental Ceramics, The World's Great Collections, vol. 10, Tokyo, 1980, no. 153. Compare, also, two other Yaozhou bowls of this pattern, one sold at Christie’s Hong Kong, from the Jingguantang Collection, 3 November 1996, lot 530, and one sold at Sotheby's London, 12 November 2003, lot 143.
The present bowl, with its attractive pale sea-green glaze, is a classic example of fine Yaozhou ware. A Yaozhou bowl of this shape with a similar pattern of two hibiscus blossoms paired with its distinctive star-shaped leaf, is in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and illustrated in Oriental Ceramics, The World's Great Collections, vol. 10, Tokyo, 1980, no. 153. Compare, also, two other Yaozhou bowls of this pattern, one sold at Christie’s Hong Kong, from the Jingguantang Collection, 3 November 1996, lot 530, and one sold at Sotheby's London, 12 November 2003, lot 143.