Lot 36. A wucai'Immortals' jar, Wanli six-character mark and of the period (1573-1620); 11.5cm (4 1/2in) high. Estimate: 3,000 - 5,000 (€ 3,500 - 5,800). © Bonhams 2001-2019

The bulbous body, probably the lower section of a double gourd vase, colorfully enamelled around the exterior with a continuous scene of Daoist Immortals carrying vases, fans and gourds issuing wispy clouds carrying shou characters, all amidst a lush garden setting with pine trees, bamboos and prunus. 

Lot 37. A rare polychrome enamelled incense burner, gui, Late Ming Dynasty; 16cm (6 1/4in) wide. Estimate: 4,000 - 6,000 (€ 4,600 - 6,900). © Bonhams 2001-2019

Of compressed globular shape, finely enamelled in tones of red, green, turquoise and yellow around the exterior with a continuous scene of egrets, kingfishers, and a pair of mandarin ducks in a lotus pond, flanked by a pair of mythical-beast-head handles. 

Note: Compare with a related polychrome-enamelled incense burner, dated 1620, illustrated in Transitional Wares and their Forerunners, Hong Kong, 1981, p.106, no.53

Lot 38. A wucai'Immortal' dish, Wanli six-character mark and of the period (1573-1620); 19.2cm (7 1/2in) diam. Estimate: 6,000 - 8,000 (€ 6,900 - 9,200). © Bonhams 2001-2019

With gently everted rim, decorated on the interior with an immortal standing in a garden, holding a ruyi sceptre and accompanied by two acolytes carrying respectively a coral vase and a bottle issuing vaporous air, all amidst flowering shrubs and wispy clouds and enclosed by a border of leafy scrolls interspersed with double gourds, the reverse with the Eight Buddhist Emblems growing from blossoming lotus, the base inscribed with a six-character mark within double-circles. 

Note: For related wucai dishes, Wanli, decorated with figures in landscapes, see M.K.Hearn, Splendors of Imperial China: Treasures from the National Palace Museum, Taipei, 1996, pl.78, p.106; and J.Ho Yi Hsing, The Fame of Flame: Imperial Wares of the Jiajing and Wanli periods, Hong Kong, 2009, pp.288–289, no.115, and pp.292-293, no.117.

Lot39. A rare wucai'Palace ladies' jar, Shunzhi-Early Kangxi (1644-1722); 30cm (11 7/8in) high. Estimate: 8,000 - 10,000 (€ 9,200 - 12,000). © Bonhams 2001-2019

The jar of shouldered ovoid shape decorated to the exterior with a continuous scene of ladies and two officials with an attendant within a court scene, surrounded by rocks and foliage, all below two bands of peony sprays and flowering blossoms, the shoulder flanked by six chilong-shaped lug handles.

Lot 40. A pair of wucai flaring vases, Gu, Shunzhi period (1664-1661). Each 54cm (21 1/4in) high. Estimate: 12,000 - 15,000 (€ 14,000 - 17,000). © Bonhams 2001-2019

Each vase decorated in bright enamels and underglaze blue on the flared top section with a continuous scene of courtly ladies and scholarly gentlemen engaged in leisurely pursuits within a garden setting, a band of peonies to the mid section, and pomegranates to the lower section.

Provenance: Christie's New York, 8 October 2013, lot 182.

Paul Cézanne (1839-1906), Bouilloire et fruits, oil on canvas, painted circa 1888-1890. Estimate: In the region of $40 million. Price Realized: $59,295,000 / £45,611,538 /€52,726,938. © Christie's Images Ltd 2019

NEW YORK, NY.- The top lots of the sale were Cézanne’s Bouilloire et fruits, which sold for $59,295,000 to client on the phone and Van Gogh’s Arbres dans le jardin de l'asile, which realized $40,000,000. 

Lot 15. Vincent van Gogh (1853-1890), Arbres dans le jardin de l'asile, oil on canvas, 16 3/8 x 13 ¼ in. (41.6 x 33.5 cm.) Painted in Saint Rémy, October 1889. Estimate On Request.Price realised USD 40,000,000. © Christie's Image Ltd 2019.

Strong results achieved for collections: 

• Masterpieces from The Collection of S.I. Newhouse was launched in the Impressionist and Modern Art Evening Sale with an outstanding result for the five lots offered, with a total to date of $100,955,000. This first grouping was led by Paul Cézanne’s Bouilloire et fruits, which realized $59,295,000 and Vincent van Gogh’s Arbres dans le jardin de l'asile, which sold for $40,000,000. The collection will continue with six lots presented in the Post-War and Contemporary Art Evening Sale on 15 May. 

• The Robert B. and Beatrice C. Mayer Family Collection achieved a running total of $13,527,000, led by Pissarro’s Le Jardin d’Octave Mirbeau, la terrasse, Les Damps, which sold for $6,177,000. Further works will be offered throughout 20th Century Week, including a dedicated selection that will commence the Evening Sale of Post-War and Contemporary Art. 

Lot  29. Camille Pissarro (1830-1903), Le Jardin d'Octave Mirbeau, la terrasse, Les Damps, signed and dated 'C. Pissarro. 1892' (lower left), oil on canvas, 28 ¾ x 36 ¼ in. (73 x 92 cm.) Painted in 1892. Estimate USD 3,000,000 - USD 5,000,000. Price realised USD 6,177,000. © Christie's Image Ltd 2019.

Provenance: Galerie Durand-Ruel et Cie., Paris (acquired from the artist, 10 December 1892).
Durand-Ruel Galleries, New York (acquired from the above, 29 November 1893). 
Galerie Durand-Ruel et Cie., Paris (acquired from the above, 12 December 1893). 
Jean and Marie-Louise d'Alayer, Paris (by decent from the above, 1950).
Sam Salz, New York (acquired from the above, June 1953).
Acquired from the above by the present owner, 22 January 1954.

Literature: L.-R. Pissaro and L. Venturi, Camille Pissarro, son art–son oeuvre, Paris, 1939, vol. I, p. 194, no. 807 (illustrated, vol. II, pl. 166).
J. Bailly-Herzberg, Correspondance de Camille Pissarro, 1886-1890, Paris, 1988, vol. III, p. 250, no. 807; pp. 257-258, no. 816; pp. 260-261, no. 818; p. 269, no. 827; pp. 269-270, no. 828. 
P. Michel and J.-F. Nivet, Octave Mirbeau: Correspondance avec Camille Pissarro, Charente, 1990, pp. 136-137, no. 58.
J. Pissarro, Camille Pissarro, New York, 1993, p. 236, no. 278 (illustrated). 
M. Ward, Pissarro: Neo-Impressionism and the Spaces of the Avant-Garde, Chicago, 1996, pp. 254-256 (illustrated, p. 256, fig. 11.8).
J. Pissarro and C. Durand-Ruel Snollaerts, Pissarro: Catalogue critique des peintures, Paris, 2005, vol. III, p. 625, no. 954 (illustrated in color).

Exhibited: Paris, Galerie Durand-Ruel et Cie., Exposition d'oeuvres récentes de Camille Pissarro, March 1893, no. 28 (titled La Terrasse).
New York, Durand-Ruel Galleries, Paintings by Camille Pissarro, November-December 1903, no. 28.
New York, The Union League Club, Exhibition of Paintings by the Master Impressionists, November 1932, no. 17 (incorrectly titled Jardin de Merbeau, la terrasse).
San Francisco Museum of Art, Opening with the Fifty-Fifth Annual Exhibition of the San Francisco Art Association, January 1935, p. 39, no. 29.
Albany Institute of History and Art, Exhibition of Paintings by the Master Impressionists, October-November 1935, no. 16.
The Baltimore Museum of Art, C. Pissarro, November 1936, no. 9 (titled Terrace of the Garden of Mirbeau).
Jerusalem, The Israel Museum and New York, The Jewish Museum, Camille Pissarro: Impressionist Innovator, October 1994-July 1995, p. 191, no. 100 (illustrated in color).
The Cleveland Museum of Art and London, Royal Academy of the Arts, Painting the Modern Garden: Monet to Matisse, October 2015-April 2016, p. 118, no. 30 (illustrated in color).

Note: Camille Pissarro spent two weeks during September 1892 as the guest of the writer Octave Mirbeau and his wife Alice at their country home in Les Damps, a hamlet in the department of the Eure in northern France. The artist eagerly anticipated the visit throughout the summer, both for the company—Mirbeau was among the most sensitive interpreters of his work and a fellow advocate of anarchist ideals—and for the splendid motifs to be found at Les Damps. “And your garden? Have you spruced it up, decked it out, made it more attractive for me?” Pissarro wrote to his friend in July. “If time allows, I will gladly set down a memory of it on a magnificent size 30 canvas” (Letter no. 807). The grounds at Les Damps did not disappoint, and the painter was hard at work within a day of his arrival. “I have begun four landscapes,” he reported to his son Lucien, “which seem to me superb in motifs and effects, with the hills in the background” (Letter no. 816).
The present canvas—a stately size 30 (73 x 92 cm.), just as Pissarro had planned—depicts the sumptuously planted and immaculately tended terrace immediately adjacent to Mirbeau’s house, a sliver of which is visible at the far left of the scene. The focal point of the composition is the luxuriant flower bed at the right, which comprises a late summer’s pageant of colors, scents, and textures—a veritable laboratory for artistic experimentation. A young girl on the terrace seems transfixed by the spectacle, gazing upon it with a child’s natural wonder and receptivity that forms a proxy for the artist’s own intuitive response to the motif. “One must be free of everything but one’s own sensations,” Pissarro instructed Lucien in a letter from Les Damps, perhaps with this particular painting in mind (Letter no. 816).
Pissarro built up the canvas from myriad tiny touches of complementary hues—blue and orange, green and red—to create a dense tapestry of color that seems to vibrate before our eyes, evoking the heady, immersive effect of the garden. Although the chromatic scale reflects the artist’s brief phase of experimentation with divisionism in the late 1880s, the robust and varied handling surpasses any technical formula, revealing his intense, personal absorption in the landscape. “There is something almost culinary about the way the material of the paint has been applied and manipulated on the surface of the work,” Joachim Pissarro has written. “It is breathtakingly painterly, the result of an incredibly multifarious technique, alternating between thick impasto composed of several underlayers of paint, and tiny fragmented strokes revealing Pissarro’s supple and confident hand” (op. cit., 1993, p. 237).
The heterogeneous, organic forms of the flowers and trees contrast with the crisply linear edging of the garden beds, which marks out an enclosed haven for the child on the terrace—perhaps a relative or neighbor of Mirbeau, roughly the same age as Pissarro’s youngest son Paul-Émile. In the middle distance, beyond the diminutive figure, the sweep of the terrace guides the viewer’s eye toward a low boundary wall and a screen of trees, which frame a partial vista over the gently rolling hills of the Seine valley. Pissarro made two smaller paintings of Mirbeau’s terrace that focus, respectively, on the garden plantings and this wider landscape prospect (Pissarro and Durand-Ruel Snollaerts, nos. 953 and 956); the fourth canvas from Les Damps depicts a more rustic corner of the property near the henhouse (no. 955). Only in the present scene did Pissarro connect the cultivated world of the terrace with the fertile, agricultural terrain beyond, conjuring a utopian vision of the whole of France as an expansive, communal garden.
The sojourn at Les Damps, by Pissarro’s own account, was a great success. “You spoiled me royally,” he wrote to Mirbeau, “and I don’t know how to thank Madame Mirbeau for going to such trouble. As soon as I got home, I looked at my four canvases in white frames. Though they didn’t show to good effect in your place, they’re rather good.” His only regret was that he had not had time to paint more: “The cabbages with a garnishing of sunlight; they would have been beautiful to do” (Letter no. 818). In December, Durand-Ruel purchased nineteen recent paintings from Pissarro, including the present canvas and two others from Les Damps; Pissarro held back the smallest from the series as a gift for Mirbeau. “I think you have the cream of the crop,” Pissarro assured the dealer when he inquired about the missing painting (Letter no. 846). Durand-Ruel’s acquisitions enabled Pissarro to repay 7000 francs of the loan that the better-heeled Monet had made to him earlier in the year to purchase his house at Éragny, which he had rented since 1884.
In March 1893, Durand-Ruel featured all four paintings from Les Damps in an important solo exhibition of Pissarro’s work, with Mirbeau loaning his canvas for the occasion. Anticipating the open-ended serial modality of the artist’s final decade, the majority of the pictures in the show—31 of a total of 46—came from three different projects that played off one another formally and thematically, creating links between public and private, city and country, and so on. “The Série des jardins de Kew depicted the casual and open sweeps of the London city garden, dotted with finely attired figures,” Martha Ward has written. “The Série des vues de ma fenêtre àÉragny showed agricultural landscapes in different seasons with fruit trees and a steeple-gauged hillside. The Série des jardins represented the opulent gardens of Octave Mirbeau, with exotic flowers, sheltered and overgrown spaces, a place of solitude” (op. cit., 1996, p. 254).

• The Collection of Drue Heinz launched this evening with a running total of $77,529,500, highlighted by Amedeo Modigliani’s Lunia Czechowska (à la robe noire), which achieved $25,245,000 and Pierre Bonnard’s La Terrasse ou Une terrasse à Grasse which sold for a world auction record for the artist at auction: $19,570,000. 

Lot 25. Amedeo Modigliani (1884-1920), Lunia Czechowska (à la robe noire), signed 'modigliani' (upper right), oil on canvas, 36 3/8 x 23 5/8 in. (92.4 x 60 cm.). Painted in 1919. Estimate USD 12,000,000 - USD 18,000,000. Price realised USD 25,245,000© Christie's Image Ltd 2019

Lot 42. Pierre Bonnard (1867-1947), La Terrasse ou Une terrasse à Grasse, signed 'Bonnard' (lower left), oil on canvas, 49 ¼ x 52 7/8 in. (125.3 x 134.4 cm.) Painted in Grasse, 1912. Estimate USD 5,000,000 - USD 8,000,000. Price realised USD 19,570,000 © Christie's Image Ltd 2019

Provenance: Galerie Bernheim-Jeune et Cie., Paris (acquired from the artist, 15 June 1912). 
Gaston Bernheim de Villers, Paris (acquired from the above, 1927). 
Acquired from the family of the above by the late owner, January 1961

Literature: G. Coquiot, Bonnard, Paris, 1922, p. 47 (illustrated). 
H. Rumpel, Bonnard, Bern, 1952, p. 31, no. 32 (illustrated). 
"Cinquante Bonnard" in Le Monde, 18 May 1956, p. 18 (dated 1908). 
G. Hilaire, "Féerie intérieure" in Dimanche-Matin, 10 June 1956. 
J. and H. Dauberville, Bonnard: Catalogue raisonné de l'oeuvre peint, 1906-1919, Paris, 1968, vol. II, p. 263, no. 698 (illustrated).
A. Davis, "Sutton Place Townhouse: Italian Designer Blends Fine Art and Décor" in Architectural Digest, December 1977, pp. 38-47 (illustrated in color in situ in Drue Heinz's home, p. 38). 
M. Terrasse, Bonnard: Du dessin au tableau, Paris, 1996, p. 91 (illustrated in color). 
A. Kostenevich, Bonnard and the Nabis, New York, 2005, p. 108 (illustrated in color, p. 111). 
V. Serrano, Entre chiens & chats: Bonnard et l'animalité, exh. cat., Musée Bonnard, Paris, 2016, pp. 66 and 153 (illustrated in color, p. 68, fig. 21).

Exhibited: Paris, Galerie Bernheim-Jeune et Cie., Bonnard: Oeuvres récentes, June-July 1912, no. 20. 
Kunsthaus Zürich, Pierre Bonnard, Edouard Vuillard, May-July 1932, p. 22, no. 75 (with inverted dimensions and dated 1917). 
Venice, XIXa Esposizione Biennale Internazionale d'Arte, 1934, p. 284, no. 39 (titled Tavola da giardino). 
Paris, Galerie Bernheim-Jeune et Cie., Hommage à Bonnard, May-July 1956, no. 12 (dated 1908). 
Paris, Galerie Jean-Claude et Jacques Bellier, Bonnard: Peintures, November-December 1960, p. 23, no. 25 (illustrated; titled Table de jardin). 
London, Royal Academy of Arts, Pierre Bonnard, January-March 1966, p. 59, no. 189 (titled La table de jardin and dated 1926). 
New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art (on extended loan, August-October 2001).

Note: A pageant of high-keyed color and luxuriant, Mediterranean vegetation, this idyllic scene—one of Bonnard’s earliest tours de force on the theme of the terrace—depicts the grounds of the Villa Antoinette at Grasse, some twelve miles north of Cannes, where the artist and his future wife Marthe stayed on holiday from January to May 1912. The composition is structured around an elegant stone balustrade, which divides the large canvas—more than four feet per side—into two distinct zones. The foreground is given over to the cloistered, domestic realm of the terrace, with its lively array of potted plants and a trio of resident cats; Marthe sits at the very periphery of the scene, her back to the viewer, while one of the couple’s pet dachshunds basks in the sun. Beyond the balustrade is the garden of the Villa Antoinette, where the flora—a meridional paradise of palms and laden orange trees—was left to grow wild and unpruned, just as Bonnard preferred; at the right, the dense mass of trees parts to reveal a glimpse of the violet-tinged Esterel mountains in the distance.
La Terrasse constitutes a paean to the hot, heightened palette and dazzling luminosity of the Côte d’Azur. Orange, pink, and gold are set off against complementary tones of green and blue; a ray of silvery light enters the scene from the right and falls diagonally across the terrace, catching at the edges of the foliage and casting an otherworldly, white glow over the hieratic cat on a stool in the center. Bonnard had made his first extended trip to this sun-drenched region three years earlier, spending the summer of 1909 at Saint-Tropez, the home of Paul Signac and a Mecca for aspiring colorists. Like Van Gogh when he arrived at Arles in 1888, Bonnard experienced the South of France with all the force of a revelation. “It was like something out of the Arabian Nights,” he declared. “The sea, the yellow walls, the reflections as full of color as the light” (quoted in Bonnard: Painting Arcadia, exh. cat., Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, 2015, p. 315). 
In August 1912, just months after their stay at Grasse, Bonnard and Marthe purchased a small house called Ma Roulotte (“My Caravan”) at Vernonnet, a village on the banks of the Seine near Giverny. For the next 25 years, until late in his life, the artist lived a profoundly peripatetic existence, peregrinating between the Seine valley—the birthplace of Impressionism—and various sites in the Midi, including Saint-Tropez, Antibes, Cannes, and eventually Le Cannet. “For a realist from the north like Bonnard, southern light was a prerequisite for his emerging art of color,” Nicholas Watkins has explained. “Yet he needed, as he said, the lush pastures and passing clouds of the north as a fitting complement to the heat and timelessness of the south, in the same way that an intense red engenders a green after-image” (Bonnard, London, 1994, pp. 124 and 127). 
La Terrasse is one of the two largest canvases that Bonnard painted during his exceptionally productive stay at Grasse, both major decorative statements visualizing the Côte d’Azur as a modern-day Arcadia. The other is a panoramic composition entitled L’Été, which depicts the view from the upper-story balcony of the Villa Antoinette over the surrounding landscape; the terrace of the house is visible at the far right, receding into depth (Dauberville, no. 720; Pushkin Museum, Moscow). Bonnard may well have hoped that the mural-sized Été would appeal to the eminent Russian collector Ivan Morozov, who had commissioned the imposing triptych Méditerrannée from the artist two years earlier, and he was not disappointed. When the paintings from Grasse were exhibited at Bernheim-Jeune in June 1912, Morozov immediately laid claim to L’Été; Bonnard subsequently completed a pair of panels for the collector on the themes of spring and autumn (nos. 716 and 718; Pushkin Museum, Moscow). 
In L’Été, Bonnard developed the pastoral associations of the Côte d’Azur, imagining Marthe as the central protagonist in a lively, social vignette of goatherds and dancing girls. In La Terrasse, by contrast, he created a private, enclosed world that evokes the sultry heat and languorous reverie of a Mediterranean afternoon. Marthe is now subordinate to the colorful profusion of vegetation, her motionless figure registering to the viewer within the warp and weft of the composition only after a slight, almost imperceptible delay; her sun-dappled blue jacket and brown cloche hat seem to merge, wraith-like, with the surrounding ground of the terrace. “This dreaming feminine presence, Marthe,” Sasha Newman has written, “who so often appears in cut-off views—glimpsed on a balcony, through a door, or reflected in a mirror—is central to the underlying air of mystery in much of Bonnard’s art” (Bonnard: The Late Paintings, exh. cat., Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C., 1984, p. 146). 
Bonnard continued to explore the pictorial possibilities of the terrace intermittently throughout his career, most notably in a series of large, decorative canvases from the late teens and twenties that depict the grounds of Ma Roulotte. As in the present canvas, these compositions are structured around the layered planes of terrace, garden, and surrounding countryside, generating a play among various scales and distances. The terrace functions as a liminal space, midway between the intimacy of the interior and the expansiveness of landscape, comparable to the balcony in contemporaneous paintings by Matisse such as Femme au balcon à l’ombrelle verte, 1918-1919. At the same time, Bonnard’s virtuoso handling of color creates a unitary, tapestry-like surface that mitigates depth and asserts the modernist primacy of the picture plane. “The principal subject is the surface,” Bonnard maintained, “which has its color, its laws over and above those of objects. It’s not a matter of painting life, it’s a matter of giving life to painting” (quoted in N. Watkins, op. cit., 1994, p. 171).

• A Family Vision: The Collection of H.S.H. Princess “Titi” von Fürstenberg sold for a total to date of $47,400,500, with strong results across period and style including the collection’s top lot, Pablo Picasso’s La Lettre (La Réponse), which sold for $25,245,000, and Marc Rothko’s No. 16/No. 12 (Mauve Intersection), which sold for $5,382,500. Additional lots will be offered in the Impressionist and Modern Art Day Sales on 14 May.  

Lot 64A. Pablo Picasso (1881-1973), La Lettre (La Réponse), signed and dated ‘Picasso 23’ (lower right); dated '16 Avril-23' (on the stretcher), oil on canvas, 39 ½ x 31 7/8 in. (100.3 x 81 cm.) Painted in Paris, 16 April 1923. Estimate USD 20,000,000 - USD 30,000,000. Price realised USD 25,245,000.© Christie's Image Ltd 2019

Lot 63. Mark Rothko (1903-1970), No. 16/No. 12 (Mauve Intersection), oil on canvas, 58 3/8 x 64 ¼ in. (135.6 x 163.2 cm.) Painted in 1949. Estimate USD 2,000,000 - USD 3,000,000. Price realised USD 5,382,500. © Christie's Image Ltd 2019

• The Sherwood Collection sold for a running total of $20,455,000, led by a world auction record for Balthus, which achieved $19,002,500. Further works from the collection will be offered in the Impressionist and Modern Art Day Sales on 14 May 2019.

Lot 8 A. Balthus (1908-2001), Thérèse sur une banquette, signed and dated 'Balthus 1939' (lower left), oil on board, 28 5/8 x 36 ¼ in. (72.7 x 91.9 cm.) Painted in 1939. Estimate USD 12,000,000 - USD 18,000,000. Price realised USD 19,002,500. © Christie's Image Ltd 2019

Jeff Koons (b. 1955), Rabbit. Stainless steel, 41 x 19 x 12 in. (104.1 x 48.3 x 30.5 cm.). Executed in 1986. This work is number two from an edition of three plus one artist's proof and is accompanied by a certificate of authenticity signed by the artist. Estimate: USD 50,000,000 - USD 70,000,000. Price Realized: USD 91,075,000. © Christie's Images Ltd 2019.

et comme dit une amie: "pour moi, y a pas photo: le lapin, c'est à la moutarde avec des tagliatelles." :)

Lot 249. A white jade marriage bowl, Qianlong period (1736-1795); 8 ¾ in. (22.3 cm.) wide, across the handles. Estimate: £60,000 - £100,000. Price realised GBP 395,250. © Christie's Images Ltd 2019.

The elegant vessel is skilfully carved with rounded sides rising to an incurved rim and is supported on a slightly flaring foot. The rim is flanked by a pair of loose-ring openwork loop handles, each finely worked in low relief with a dragon with bulging eyes, a single horn and archaistic scroll design. The stone is of an even, semi-translucent tone.

Provenance: Formerly in a private collection in France, most of which was purchased in Paris during the 1960s and 1970s, and thence by descent to the present owner.

Note: Bowls of this type known as 'marriage' bowls were often presented as wedding gifts, as their carefully chosen auspicious decoration symbolised the joyful union of husband and wife. They were popular in the Qing dynasty, especially under the reign of the Qianlong Emperor. 

Lot 70. An Archaic Bronze Wine Vessel, You, Late Shang Dynasty-Western Zhou Dynasty, 12th-11th Century BC; 9 5/8 in. (24.5 cm.) high overall. Estimate GBP 60,000 - GBP 80,000. Price realised GBP 299,250. © Christie's Images Ltd 2019.

The vessel is finely cast with a broad pear-shaped body standing on a splayed foot with a loose over-head arched handle. It is boldly decorated in relief with raised flanges to the sides dividing large taotie masks on the body below a band of confronted kui dragons to the shoulder. The domed cover is decorated with raised flanges separating two taotiemasks above a band of kui dragons, and is surmounted by a bud finial. The inside of the cover and the interior base of the vessel are cast with an inscription in intaglio readingYa Tan Fu Yi, (dedicated to Father Yi of the Ya Tan clan). 

Provenance: Acquired by the vendor's grandparents in the Middle East in the 1960s, and thence by descent within the family.

Note: The current lot was loaned by the vendor's grandparents to the British Museum in 1981 for a year for study purposes. During this time, the museum wrote to the owners expressing an interest in purchasing it. 

The you was an important wine vessel and entered the religious repertoire in the first century of the Anyang period of the late Shang Dynasty. Other examples of the same period as the present lot also display the large masks on the main decorative band flanked by shaped flanges on either side, all to accentuate its face and to draw the viewers' attention to the lower body. This arrangement is also seen on a you excavated in Hunan Ningxiang, illustrated in Kaogu, 1963.12, pp. 646-7, figs.1-2, with the upper register replaced by a band of upright lappets. See also a you in the Sackler Collection with similar decoration but with handles placed on a different axis, illustrated by R. Bagley in Shang Ritual Bronzes in the Arthur M. Sackler Collections, Washington D.C., 1987, p. 372, no. 64.

The arrangements of the flanges on the cover and sides of this vessel may be compared with the late Shang dynasty-Western Zhou period you (40 cm high) excavated from Wuming Guangxi in January 1974, illustrated in Wenwu 1978.10, p 93 and later published by Robert W. Bagley in Shang Ritual bronzes in the Arthur M. Sackler Collections, Washington, 1987, fig. 64.6, p 377.

Compare the present lot with two slightly larger you (30.2 cm. and 32.3 cm. high) dated to the late Shang-early Western Zhou dynasty with bovine mask handle terminals: one sold at Christie's New York, 20 September 2005, lot 151, and the other formerly in the Idemitsu Museum, sold at Christie's Hong Kong, 29 May 2013, lot 2172.

Lot 171. Qi Baishi (1863-1957), Lotus. Signature and three seals of the artist Dated xinmao year (1951). Scroll, mounted and framed, ink and colour on paper ,53 ¾ x 23 ¾ in. (136.5 x 60.5 cm). Estimate GBP 50,000 - GBP 80,000.Price realised GBP 175,000. © Christie's Images Ltd 2019.

Provenance: Received as a wedding gift in Hong Kong in the 1950s, and thence by descent within the family.

Note: Painted in Qi's 91st year by his own reckoning, this work exemplifies his mature oeuvre. In this late stage of Qi's career his mastery of the full range of painting techniques is readily apparent. The kinetic, angular lines of the lotus stems are eloquently juxtaposed with the liquid colour washes of the broad leaves. The composition shifts between the wide, flat surfaces of the leaves and linear structures of interlocking stems, creating a dynamic cadence as the eye moves across the painting surface. 

The subject of lotuses in late summer carries numerous symbolic meanings. In Buddhism, the lotus symbolises enlightenment, pushing up through murky waters to flower in the bright sunlight. For both Buddhists and Confucians, a late summer lotus implies a long life well lived. In this painting, the majority of flowers have passed and the full seed-heads weigh heavily on the stems. This creates a botanical allegory for Qi's own stage of life, and his substantial accomplishments at the time of the work's creation. This message is reinforced by the application of Qi's 'ren chang shou' (long-lived person) seal in the lower left. The seal is playfully inverted, showing Qi's continuing irreverence for staid, conservative conventionalism.  

Lot 133. A rare massive green jade recumbent horse, 18th century; 16 1/8 in. (41 cm.) wide. Estimate GBP 80,000 - GBP 120,000. Price realised GBP 118,750. © Christie's Images Ltd 2019. 

The impressive horse is finely carved in a recumbent position with head slightly raised, with all four legs tucked underneath the body. The mane falls on both sides of the neck behind the forward-pricked ears, and the long tail is flicked over the haunch. The details of the mane are well incised and the muscular body and head are naturalistically and sympathetically modelled. The softly polished stone is of a rich, deep green tone with cloudy white flecked inclusions, carved zitan stand.

Provenance: By repute, Collection of Prince Kung (1833-98), according to Spink invoice. 
With Spink & Son Ltd., London, 17 May 1956.
Private English Collection, acquired by the vendor's grandmother in 1956, and thence by descent within the family.

(Spink Invoice)

Nobility in Repose – A Majestic Jade Horse 
Rosemary Scott, Senior, International Academic Consultant, Asia Art 

This massive and naturalistic jade carving of a recumbent horse is remarkable on a number of levels. Firstly, the jade boulder required to provide the raw material from which this horse was carved would have been exceptionally large. Secondly, the lapidary who created the horse has successfully managed to convey that the animal is tranquilly in repose, while still capturing its essential power. The head of the animal in particular has been skilfully rendered to give the impression of both noble strength and quiet intelligence. Thirdly, by repute, this jade horse was formerly in the collection of Prince Gong (Kung), sixth son of the Daoguang Emperor, (r. 1821-1850). Given the magnificence of this horse and the rarity of jades of this size and quality, it seems entirely reasonable that the horse came from the collection of a senior member of the imperial family.  

Horses long have had a long association with rank and privilege in China, and, from the Bronze Age onwards, there has been a spiritual and artistic fascination with them. Horses were valued, not only as animals which could be ridden for hunting, sport and for display but, perhaps most importantly, as creatures of war. The use of horses to draw war chariots and as steeds for cavalry proved crucial in China’s internal and external conflicts. During the Han dynasty (206 BC-AD 220), the famed Ferghana horses were introduced into central China from the West. These revered horses were known for their speed, power and stamina, and were sometimes referred to as ‘blood-sweating’ horses, or ‘thousand li horses’, after the belief that they were able to cover a thousand li in a single day. In the Tang dynasty (AD 618-907) horses were regarded as so essential to military capability and the defence of the realm, that their breeding was considered of national importance. At the beginning of the Tang dynasty China’s horse population was at a very low level but through an elaborate system of stud farms the number of horses was raised from 5,000 to 706,000 during the first fifty years of the dynasty. The stud farms were established in Gansu, Shanxi and Shaanxi, each ideally with 50,000 horses, which were assigned to herds of 120 animals. The horses were also carefully crossed with various breeds from different parts of central Asia in order to achieve the perfect blend of strength and agility. It is significant that in 703 the Tang court received several fine Arab horses. Virginia Bowers has noted that: ‘The most prized mounts for battle, hunting, and polo were quite large, perhaps sixteen hands. They had a heavier frame than today’s thoroughbreds yet their thin legs, agility, and lively manner made them different from present-day draft horses. A contemporary polo player was amazed that the ‘heavy’ horses depicted in the mural in Crown Prince Zhanghuai’s tomb could be so nimble. These Tang horses ... have the same heavy body and ‘Roman’ nose – quite different from today’s classic Arabian horses – as the horses ridden by the Sasanians, and many authorities speculate that they were all descendants of the famous ‘imperial’ Nisean breed of Achaemenid Persia, as pictured at Persepolis.’ (Virginia Bower, ‘Polo in Tang China – Sport and Art’, Asian Art, Winter 1991, pp. 27, 32.)  

The large stone carvings of horses created for the tomb of the Tang emperor Taizong (AD 626-49) also emphasise their high value and prestige. Imperial concern with horse stock and pride in their ownership continued through the dynasties and horses were depicted in art in a range of media. Paintings of horses became popular, particularly in the Yuan dynasty and remained a favourite theme. In the reign of the Qing dynasty Qianlong Emperor (AD 1736-95) the importance accorded to horses by the sovereign can clearly be seen in depictions of horses sent as tribute, and by the sheer number of paintings of horses commissioned by the emperor from the Jesuit missionary artist Giuseppe Castiglione (Lang Shining 1688-1766) alone. Some of these paintings were of individual horses from the imperial stud and their names are inscribed on the paintings.  

There are very few extant large jade carvings of horses from the early periods – the large Han dynasty jade head and partial torso of a horse in the collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum, London being an exception – partly a function of the availability of large jade boulders. The vast majority of larger jade horses date to the late Ming and Qing dynasties, but even compared to most of these the current horse is unusually large. The authors of the exhibition catalogue Jade Throughout the Ages, London, 1975 suggest the possibility that all the fine jade figures of horses and buffaloes in the exhibition ‘... once had their place in the pavilions of the various palaces in Peking.’ The authors go on to say: ‘The horses in particular are remarkable for their intense observation and their powerful stylisation of artistic form, by means of which the artist has succeeded wonderfully in conveying the alert strength of the animal despite its fundamental attitude of repose.’ (Jade Throughout the Ages, op. cit. p. 118). This is especially interesting since the current jade horse has much in common with two of the exhibited horses (nos. 391 and 394) as well as being made from an impressively large and attractively colour piece of jade.  

When this horse was sold in London in 1956, it was noted that it had previously belonged to Prince Kung (Gong). Prince Gong (1833-98), whose personal name was Yixin , was one of the most influential figures in China during the second half of the 19th century. It was he who, after the Convention of Beijing in 1860, proposed the establishment of the office of Zongli Yamen, which would be the office responsible for foreign relations during an especially turbulent period of Chinese history. As head of the Zongli Yamen and later as Prince Counsellor (yizhiwang) to Empress Dowager Cixi (1835-1908) and Empress Dowager Ci’an (1835-1881) Prince Gong played an important role in China’s domestic and international affairs. However, he supported modernization and reform, which in time brought him into conflict with Empress Dowager Cixi, and in 1884 he was removed from office and spent the remainder of his life in retirement. 

Following the death of their father the Daoguang Emperor in 1850, many had believed that Yixin, as the more able brother, would be named as successor, but instead his elder brother, Yizhu (1831-61, the Daoguang Emperor’s fourth son) was named, and it was he who ascended the throne as the Xianfeng Emperor (r. 1850-61) – the reign title meaning ‘prosperity for all’. Their father’s will, under which Yizhu became emperor, however, raised Yixin to the status of Qinwang , Imperial Prince of the First Rank, and thenceforth he had the title of Prince Gong – the name meaning ‘respectful’. Prince Gong therefore had all the privileges that went with his new status, and, in addition, in 1852 the Xianfeng Emperor rewarded his brother’s perceived loyalty by bestowing upon him one of the largest residential compounds in Beijing’s Inner City near Qianhai Lake. This palatial residence came to be known as Prince Gong’s Mansion. The mansion had been constructed by a favourite of the Qianlong Emperor, Heshen (1750-99), who became so powerful and arrogant that he had buildings in his compound built in such close resemblance to palaces in the Forbidden City that they were amongst the crimes listed when Heshen was indicted by the Jiaqing Emperor (r. 1796-1820). However, despite their contravention of court building regulations, the halls in the mansion were so exquisite that the structures remained intact long after Heshen’s own demise. When the mansion was gifted to Prince Gong, he furnished it in the most luxurious style and it became known as the most sumptuous residence in Beijing.  

Prince Gong amassed a truly remarkable collection of art. He appears to have had very refined tastes and also the rank and means by which to acquire the finest objects. His grandson Pu Wei (1880-1936), who was also known as Xiao Gongwang (Prince Gong, Junior), inherited both the title and the mansion from his grandfather in 1898. In 1912, a year after the fall of the Qing dynasty, Pu Wei decided to sell the majority of the treasures in the mansion in order to raise funds to help restore the Qing. On the 17th January, 1912, Pu Wei wrote in his diary:  

‘There will be severe regrets for this decision. A sacrifice of the family has to be made in order to extricate a troubled country. In this view, a dealer must be found for the antiques to be turned into funds.’ 

In the end the family entrusted their treasures to the Japanese dealer Yamanaka Sadajiro. In 1913 American Art Association in New York sold 536 lots on behalf of Yamanaka & Company between 27 February and 1 March, from a catalogue entitled: The Remarkable Collection of the Imperial Prince Kung of China: A Wonderful Treasury of Celestial Art, while a further 211 lots were sold in London on 5-6 March 1913. In the Preface to the New York catalogue there was an evocative description of Prince Gong’s mansion:  

"His spacious Pekin mansion is at the northwest of the Imperial palace, surrounded by a lofty, solid wall, with a group of tall, aged and imposing trees within, and presents an impressive spectacle. It was sealed from the time of his departure until the visit of the purchasers of his art collection last summer, and there was great formality in procuring entrance. In the great dining-room everything remained, by his orders, precisely as when he left, even to a half-smoked cigarette. 
Passing through one gate after another of this Imperial abode of Prince Kung, the visitor finds a straight row of buildings accommodating from three to four hundred of the Prince's followers, and the quarters of the household force. In a central location is a great building in the form of a temple pavilion, the reception-room for distinguished visitors. One passes along the veranda to the left to the great dining saloon, and across a central garden toward the right is a small library, with exhibition rooms. 
In the rear section of this building, across the center of the garden, is the great library, where, besides the numerous books to left and right, mainly bronzes and jades were shown. Leaving this library at a short distance, one came to a large, solid-looking two-story building in the form a letter L, which might be called the Fine Arts Museum, containing a countless number of precious treasures. 
Through the treasure house, and by the way of a stone arch, one entered a garden filled with trees and flowers of foreign lands, around the Tea House, the Waiting Pavilion, and the Moon View Arbor. In a place like this one might spend weeks in perfect contentment, enjoying nature and the great art collection." 

One may easily imagine the current magnificent jade horse displayed either in the Prince’s library or in the building which housed more of his treasures. Given the tactile quality of this remarkable jade horse, perhaps he might have had it in his library, so that it was closer to hand. 

Christie's. Fine Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art, London, 14 May 2019

Lot 112. A pair of cloisonné enamel caparisoned elephants, Jiaqing period (1796-1820); 12 in. (30.5 cm.) high. Estimate GBP 15,000 - GBP 25,000. Price realised GBP 93,750. © Christie's Images Ltd 2019

Each elephant is modelled in mirror image standing four-square with their heads turned to the left and right. The bodies are executed in white enamel and decorated with colourful trappings. Each back is covered by a long saddlecloth decorated with a chime amongst clouds above crashing waves, supporting a small saddle and a beribonned double gourd vase, carved, stained elm stands.

Lot 217. A group of three small white jade vessels, 18th century. The ewer, 5 ¼ in. (13.3 cm.) high. Estimate GBP 5,000 - GBP 8,000. Price realised GBP 93,750. © Christie's Images Ltd 2019

The group comprises: a 'peony' vase with ribbed sides; a ' chilong -handle' pouring vessel, and a Mughal-style ewer and cover with leafy chrysanthemums, both embellished with coloured stone inlays. The jades are of an even tone with some snow flakes, natural veins and russet inclusions. 

Lot 246. A finely-carved large greenish-white and russet jade 'landscape' boulder, Qianlong period (1736-1795); 8 ¼ in. ( 21 cm.) high. Estimate GBP 30,000 - GBP 50,000. Price realised GBP 93,750. © Christie's Images Ltd 2019

The jade is of irregular shape and is carved deeply with a scholar and two attendants on an overhanging cliff below terraced pavilions and pines. The reverse is carved with two deer on rocks between plantain trees and pines. The stone is of a pale-green tone with russet inclusions, wood stand. 

Lot 227. A large greenish-white jade facetted baluster vase and cover, 18th century; 11 ¾ in. (31 cm. high). Estimate GBP 50,000 - GBP 80,000. Price realised GBP 68,750. © Christie's Images Ltd 2019.

The body is carved to all sides in low relief with branches of prunus above a band of petal lappets. The waisted neck is carved with two elephant's-head handles. The domed cover has a raised facetted and hollowed finial and is incised with a band of stylised flower petals. The stone is of a delicate green tone with some opaque white mottling.

Provenance: Christie's New York, 2 June 1994, lot 113.
Collection of the late Gerard Arnhold (1918-2010).

Christie's. Fine Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art, London, 14 May 2019

Lot 315. A fine iron-red, famille rose and gilt-decorated tripod censer, Jiaqing six-character seal mark in iron-red and of the period (1796-1820); 14 ¼ in. (36.2 cm.) high. Estimate GBP 30,000 - GBP 50,000. Price realised GBP 60,000. © Christie's Images Ltd 2019.

The censer is finely decorated to each side with a pair of confronting five-clawed dragons in pursuit of the flaming pearl amongst bats and clouds. A bat and cloud design further embellishes the twin pierced upright handles, recessed neck and cabriole legs. The rim, sides of the handles and base of the feet are decorated with classic S-scrolls. The six-character mark is in a straight line to the rim. The recessed ring to the base is decorated in pink enamels with bats and clouds encircling a central iron-red 'bat and cloud' design. The interior is enamelled turquoise.

Christie's. Fine Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art, London, 14 May 2019

Lot 141. A rare and large cloisonné enamel lozenge-form vase, 18th century; 18 1/8 in. (46.2 cm.) High. Estimate GBP 30,000 - GBP 50,000. Price realised GBP 60,000. © Christie's Images Ltd 2019.

Each side of the diamond-section vase is elaborately and finely decorated with a different scene of pavilions among pink scrolling clouds in a river and mountainous landscape setting. The scenes are executed in great detail with the words and infilled with a melange of polychrome enamels. The neck and flare foot are decorated with squared scrolls.

Christie's. Fine Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art, London, 14 May 2019

Lot 232. A large carved cinnabar lacquer lobed dish, Ming dynasty, 16th century; 12 5/8 in. (32 cm.) diam. Estimate GBP 15,000 - GBP 25,000. Price realised GBP 50,000. © Christie's Images Ltd 2019.

The interior is carved in relief with a courtier seated in a garden before a pavilion and surrounded by various figures. The border is carved with flowers.

Christie's. Fine Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art, London, 14 May 2019

Lot 131. A large pale greyish-green jade carving of an elephant, 18th century; 9 in. (22.8 cm.) wide. Estimate GBP 40,000 - GBP 60,000. Price realised GBP 45,000. © Christie's Images Ltd 2019.

The elephant is carved standing foursquare with smiling eyes and its trunk curled to the left. The folds of the elephant's skin are embellished with finely incised detail. The elephant's back and base of the feet are pierced with apertures for mounting. The stone is of a pale greenish tone suffused with grey veined inclusions, wood stand.

Christie's. Fine Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art, London, 14 May 2019

Giorgione (c. 1477/78–c. 1510), La Vecchia, 1502–08, oil on canvas, 26 3/4 x 23 1/4 in. (68 x 59 cm), Gallerie dell’Accademia, cat. 272, © G.A. VE Photo Archive, Courtesy of the Ministry of Cultural Heritage and Activities—Gallerie dell’Accademia, Venice.

 HARTFORD, CONN.- Giorgione's startling allegory La Vecchia (known as The Old Woman) is on view at the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Artfrom May 15 to August 4, 2019. Despite the mystery of his biography and the few paintings that can be attributed to him, Giorgione (1474/6-1510) is considered one of the greatest artists of the Venetian Renaissance. With this empathetic painting of an old woman, Giorgione created a portrayal of aging and a reminder of human vanity and the fleeting nature of life. The Wadsworth presents this singular work in conjunction with the Cincinnati Art Museum, due to the initiative of the Foundation for Italian Art and Culture (FIAC), which has facilitated its loan from the Gallerie dell'Accademia in Venice, Italy. 

"La Vecchia is Giorgione's poetic response to the natural phenomenon of aging," says Oliver Tostmann, Susan Morse Hilles Curator of European Art of the Wadsworth. "It is a milestone in European portraiture in which Giorgione shows old age with implacable explicitness. It prompts us to confront our own mortality and the inevitable truth of growing old." 

The hyperrealistic portrayal of a haggard woman looking directly at us both attracts and repels at the same time. With her lips open as if about to speak, she gestures to herself. In her hand is a slip of paper inscribed with the words col tempo, "with time." Painted more than 500 years ago, the unsparing naturalism and representation of the effects of aging are unexpected, a striking departure from the more familiar, idealized portraits of the time. A recent conservation treatment, funded by FIAC, has removed discoloration and breathed new life into La Vecchia. 

Venice around 1500 was a center of cultural and artistic activity where private patronage of the arts thrived. Giorgione was an innovator, introducing new subjects including the nude figure in a landscape, mythological scenes, and sensitive portraits. He is considered one of the leading Venetian painters during the Renaissance, yet he remains one of the most enigmatic. Little is known about Giorgione's life. Born in Castelfranco, he came to fame during the early sixteenth century and died in his early 30s. After experiencing Giorgione's La Vecchia visitors will be invited to view the Wadsworth's collection of Italian works of art including important Venetian Renaissance paintings by artists such as Sebastiano del Piombo, Tintoretto, and Jacopo Bassano. A group of deluxe books designed for and published by the famed Aldus Manutius--Venice's leading purveyor of ancient and modern texts, known for their elegant design--are on view adjacent the Giorgione, as is the museum's Andrea Previtali, Madonna and Child with a Donor in a landscape (c. 1504-05). 

"Rarely do we have such a prime opportunity to reconnect with our shared humanity and with the Renaissance," says Thomas J. Loughman, Director and CEO of the Wadsworth. "La Vecchia is without parallel in America as a major allegorical portrait by Giorgione, and this recent conservation provides the perfect occasion to learn and appreciate the ideas behind the painting afresh."