An Iron-Red Porcelain ‘Kui Dragon’ Snuff Bottle Qing Dynasty, Qianlong / Jiaqing Period

Quek Kiok Lee Collection, Singapore.
Sotheby’s London, 6th June 1988, lot 4.

Moss et al., 1996-2009, vol. 6, no. 1175.

Slight wear to the red enamels on the lip and foot and in places on the mouldings on both sides. Some tiny nibbles, one on the nose of one lion mask and in two places on the inner edge of the mouldings.
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One of the many ceramic innovations in snuff bottles towards the end of the Qianlong period was imitation in porcelain of imperial glass overlay bottles. This design of confronting kui dragons and a shou character was a common subject on glass snuff bottles from the Qianlong era. Even without the clue provided by the subject matter, however, the neat enamelling just of all the relief detail leaves us in no doubt as to its original inspiration. The additional enamelling of the lip, upper neck rim, and foot rim imitates the glass-overlay lip and foot so often found on late-Qianlong glass overlays. (The overlaid foot rim, of course, was much earlier, but the overlay lip seems to have become popular at court during the second half of the eighteenth century.) The imperial nature of this bottle is also suggested by the tiny mask handles set high on the shoulders, with their canine heads, floppy ears, and small, circular rings.

Although the present example has been previously dated to the nineteenth century, dated examples are predominantly from the late Qianlong reign, and the occasional appearance of a Jiaqing-marked example supports the proposition that they were briefly fashionable during the last decade of the eighteenth century.

This, however, is an unusual version and may be one of the earlier ones. The interior joints confirm that it was made from a two-part mould. Careful measurement and comparison of the various elements suggest that both sides were taken from the same mould, which is after all the most convenient method of producing a moulded bottle that is to have identical designs on each main side.