Lot 47. Blue and White Guan-Type Jar with Lion Mask Handles, Ming dynasty (1368-1644). Estimation : 4 420 €. Photo Auctionata AG
Porcelain with underglaze blue painting. Baluster shaped body with tapering sides on a slightly recessed base to a rounded shoulder with flaring neck and everted waisted rim. Lion mask handles flank the shoulder. The wall with a revolving a garden setting with scholars and armed warriors with weapons or on horseback. Framed by double circles and a band of petal lappets at the foot and the shoulder. The neck with a freely painted band of crashing waves and the flat mouth rim encircled by key fret border. Height: 35.5 cm. Good age related condition.
Such vessels of this type were made for imperial use as well as for the export market. In their embellishment and shape they were produced to suit the Mongol taste and the Central Asian markets.
Cf. a similar jar of this type from the Yuan dynasty in the collection of The Cleveland Museum of Art, illustrated in Chinese Art Under the Mongols: The Yüan Dynasty (1279-1368), Cleveland 1968, no. 156, also illustrated by R. Krahl, Chinese Ceramics in the Topkapi Saray Museum, Istanbul, London 1986, vol. II, p. 503, no. 587, in the British Museum, London, illustrated in Jessica Rawson, The British Museum Book of Chinese Art, London 1992, pl. 177 and Alexander Pope, Chinese Porcelains from the Ardebil Shrine, London, 1956, pl. 27. A similar jar was exhibited by Yuan and Ming Blue and White Porcelain, David Lin and Co., Taipei 2000, cat. no. 1.
Les Yeux de l'Asie. Chine et Japon, le 02 Août 2016 à 14h00 (2 pm CET) - AUCTIONATA AG, 10719 BERLIN