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Lot Essay
Stem cups became a popular form in porcelain during the Yuan dynasty. The majority of these had a broad bowl with everted rim on top of a tall, flaring foot, which could either be ridged, like bamboo, or smooth. The form was equally popular in plain white with only molded decoration, or embellished with underglaze painted designs. The majority of these stem cups have molded decoration on the inside of the walls of the bowl. This is most commonly a design of dragons, but in the case of the Falk stem cup, the design is of clouds. The motif painted in the center of the interior varies considerably, and can include clouds, chrysanthemums and Buddhist conch shells, like the one seen inside the Falk cup.
The dragons on the exterior of these cups are very distinctive, with neck back and head forward to form a compressed S-form, and the scales depicted using cross-hatching. A number of these cups are known. Two others, one from the Severance A. Millikin collection, Cleveland, and one from the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, were displayed alongside the Falk cup in the exhibition Chinese Art Under the Mongols, nos. 130 and 131 respectively. The molded decoration on the interior of these bowls is of dragons and clouds in the Cleveland bowl and petal panels in the Oxford bowl. Another similar bowl, now in the Jilin Provincial Museum, with a design of geese and a dragon, is illustrated in Zhongguo Wenwu Jinghua Daquan - Taoci juan, Taipei, 1993, p. 336, no. 565. A further example, excavated from the tomb of Wang Xingzu, who was buried in AD 1371, outside the Zhongyang Gate, Nanjing, has a design of dragons molded on the interior walls; see Wang Qingzheng, Underglaze Blue and Red, Hong Kong, 1993, p. 61, no. 33. The majority of these, like the Falk stem bowl, have a freely drawn classic scroll in underglaze blue around the interior mouth.
The Falk 14th century blue and white stem cup belongs to a rare group on which the stem is painted with encircling blue lines, while the majority of the other examples have stems which are ridged to resemble bamboo. However, the remains of a stem cup excavated at the Zhushan kiln site, Jingdezhen, with similar blue lines encircling its unridged stem, is illustrated in Ceramic Finds from Jingdezhen Kilns, Fung Ping Shan Museum, University of Hong Kong, 1992, no. 127.
For a Yuan stem cup of this type with an unridged stem, which has been painted in underglaze blue with a band of pendent plantain leaves, in the Palace Museum, Beijing, see The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum, Blue and White Porcelain with Underglaze Red (I), Hong Kong, 2000, p. 14, no. 12.
The dragons on the exterior of these cups are very distinctive, with neck back and head forward to form a compressed S-form, and the scales depicted using cross-hatching. A number of these cups are known. Two others, one from the Severance A. Millikin collection, Cleveland, and one from the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, were displayed alongside the Falk cup in the exhibition Chinese Art Under the Mongols, nos. 130 and 131 respectively. The molded decoration on the interior of these bowls is of dragons and clouds in the Cleveland bowl and petal panels in the Oxford bowl. Another similar bowl, now in the Jilin Provincial Museum, with a design of geese and a dragon, is illustrated in Zhongguo Wenwu Jinghua Daquan - Taoci juan, Taipei, 1993, p. 336, no. 565. A further example, excavated from the tomb of Wang Xingzu, who was buried in AD 1371, outside the Zhongyang Gate, Nanjing, has a design of dragons molded on the interior walls; see Wang Qingzheng, Underglaze Blue and Red, Hong Kong, 1993, p. 61, no. 33. The majority of these, like the Falk stem bowl, have a freely drawn classic scroll in underglaze blue around the interior mouth.
The Falk 14th century blue and white stem cup belongs to a rare group on which the stem is painted with encircling blue lines, while the majority of the other examples have stems which are ridged to resemble bamboo. However, the remains of a stem cup excavated at the Zhushan kiln site, Jingdezhen, with similar blue lines encircling its unridged stem, is illustrated in Ceramic Finds from Jingdezhen Kilns, Fung Ping Shan Museum, University of Hong Kong, 1992, no. 127.
For a Yuan stem cup of this type with an unridged stem, which has been painted in underglaze blue with a band of pendent plantain leaves, in the Palace Museum, Beijing, see The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum, Blue and White Porcelain with Underglaze Red (I), Hong Kong, 2000, p. 14, no. 12.