A cloisonné enamel moonflask, Late Ming dynasty | 明末 掐絲琺瑯纏枝蓮紋抱月瓶

This elegant moonflask assumes an immediate sense of familiarity through the elegantly rendered design and shape, both of which were made to emulate historical masterpieces of the early Ming dynasty. See a closely related example in the Pierre Uldry collection, similarly decorated with lotus flowers but centred on a trigram medallion, illustrated in Helmut Brinker and Albert Lutz, Chinesisches Cloisonné: Die Sammlung Pierre Uldry, Zurich, 1984, pl. 188; and another related moonflask decorated with rockwork and butterfly, published in Harry Garner, Chinese and Japanese Cloisonné Enamels, London, 1962, pl. 54; and a slightly larger cloisonné moonflask, sold at Christie's London, 11th July 2006, lot 81.