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Chinese Art: Dragon Stem Cup Blue and White Ming Dynasty

Fine Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art including Export Art
SALE L03211 LOT 151
SESSION 1 | 12 Nov 03 2:00 PM.
London, New Bond Street
FROM A PRIVATE ENGLISH COLLECTION
AN EXTREMELY RARE BLUE AND WHITE 'DRAGON' STEMCUP
MARK AND PERIOD OF XUANDE

8,000—12,000 GBP
Lot Sold. Hammer Price with Buyer's Premium: 21,000 GBP
MEASUREMENTS
diameter 10.2cm., 4in.
DESCRIPTION
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
the shallow rounded bowl with finely potted sides gently curving to a flared rim, supported on a high splayed foot, decorated with five dragons reserved in white, writhing against a raging torrent intricately picked out in varying shades of underglaze-blue, the five-clawed dragons with delicately incised scaly bodies and underglaze-blue dots delineating their eyes, the six-character mark inscribed in the centre of the bowl within a double circle
PROVENANCE
Collection of H.R.N. Norton
CATALOGUE NOTE
Only a very small number of Xuande stemcups of this pattern appear to be recorded. One in the National Place Museum collection, Taiwan, was included in the special exhibition Ming Xuande ciqi tezhan mulu, National Palace Museum, Taipei, 1980, cat.no. 69, and also in the Special Exhibition of Selected Hsüan-te Imperial Porcelains of the Ming Dynasty, National Palace Museum, 1998, cat.no. 79; one in the British Museum is illustrated in Jessica Harrison-Hall, Catalogue of Late Yuan and Ming Ceramics in the British Museum, London, 2001, p. 127, pl. 4:12; and a third in the Percival David Foundation is included in Margaret Medley, Illustrated Catalogue of Underglaze Blue and Copper Red, London, 1976, cat.no. A 635. Compare also two similar stemcups from private collections, one included in the Exhibition of Blue-Decorated Porcelain of the Ming Dynasty, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, 1949, cat.no. 73; and the other from the A.D. Brankston collection included in the exhibition Ming Blue-and-White Porcelain, The Oriental Ceramic Society, London, 1946, cat.no. 24.

JBOC Note: Emperor Xuande of the Ming Dynasty b. 1398 d. 1435) reigned from 1425 to his death in 1435.

I am not looking to buy or sell. I am reviewing this object to place it in context and to use it as a teaching aid. \

Thanks and best wishes,

J. Barry O'Connell Jr.

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