QIANLONG PERIOD (1736-1795)

Details

AN IMPERIAL INSCRIBED CLOISONNE ENAMEL ‘PRUNUS’ WALL VASE
QIANLONG PERIOD (1736-1795)
The baluster vase is decorated with a shaped cartouche on the body enclosing an inscription excerpted from a Qianlong imperial poem praising the prunus, followed by a four-character seal reading chen Yu Minzhong, ‘[presented by your] vassal, Yu Minzhog’, reserved on a white ground embellished with red scrolling lotus and upright plantain leaves on the neck, supported by gilt-bronze openwork handles in the form of prunus blossoms, all affixed on a separately cast gilt-bronze rock-form base.
10 1⁄2 in. (26.5 cm.) high

Provenance

Weidmann & Sohn, Zollikon, Switzerland, 3 July 1969
Mr. Martin Gross (1922-2017), Biel, Switzerland

Conditions of sale

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Lot Essay

The poem inscribed on the current vase was composed by the Qianlong Emperor, recorded in Qing Gaozong yuzhi shiwen quanji, Compilation of Imperial Poems, vol. 1, juan 1 (fig. 1). Compare with three other similar cloisonné enamel wall vases in the National Palace Museum, Taipei, decorated with different floral-form handles and imperial poems corresponding to each of the flowers, see collection numbers: zhong-fa-000162 (magnolia, fig. 2), zhong-fa-000577 (osmanthus), and zhong-fa-000579 (peach blossoms). All three examples and the present vase bear the seals of Yu Minzhong (1714-1779), a prominent scholar-official during the Qianlong period, suggesting that each of the inscription is probably based on an original by him.

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