A CELADON-GLAZED DOUBLE-GOURD VASE

Description:

China, Qianlong six-character seal mark and of the period
H. 31,6 cm
Elegantly potted with compressed globular lower bulb rising from the countersunk base to a smaller teardrop-shaped upper bulb, covered overall with a soft celadon glaze pooling to a darker tone at the recess, the lightceladon-glazed base with Qianlong six-character mark in underglaze blue.
Old European private collection
With it's elegant 'double gourd' silhouette and jade-like celadon tone, the present vase carries associations of immortality and purity. Numerous examples produced at the imperial kilns during the Qianlong emperor's reign have survived. A pair of these vases, now in the collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art (acc. nos. 1997.1.5 and 1997.1.6), is published in Suzanne Valenstein, The Herzman Collection of Chinese Ceramics, New York, 1992, no. 98. Another was included in the exhibition Qing Imperial Monochromes: The Zande Lou Collection, Art Museum, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, 2005, cat. no. 42; and one in the Meiyintang Collection is illustrated in Regina Krahl, Chinese Ceramics from the Meiyintang Collection, vol. 2, London, 1994, pl. 864. Other vases of this type include one in the Nanjing Museum that was included in the The Exhibition of Qing Imperial Porcelain of the Kangxi, Yongzheng, Qianlong Reigns, 1995, cat. no. 69; and a vase published in Chinese Porcelain: The S.C. Ko Tianminlou Collection, vol. I, Hong Kong, 1987, pl. 106. See also Qianlong seal mark and period celadon-glazed double-gourd vases that have come to market, such as one from the Gordon Collection sold at Christie's, New York, 24 March 2011, lot 1135; another sold in their London rooms, 12 November 2010, lot 1450; a third vase sold first at Sotheby's, Hong Kong, 29 November 1976, lot 541 and later at Christie's, Hong Kong, 28 May 2014, lot 3308. More recently, a vase of this type from the Chauncey D. Stillman Collection sold at Christie's, New York, 14 September 2017, lot 1249; and one from the Chuan Ching Tang Collection sold at Sotheby's, Hong Kong, 9 April 2024, lot 3706 - Good condition