清乾隆 / 嘉慶 青花花卉圖獅耳鼻煙壺

Gerry P. Mack 收藏
Gary Mack 收藏
Robert Kleiner，倫敦，1999年

Robert Kleiner，《Precious Playthings: Important Chinese Snuff Bottles from the Mack Collection》，倫敦，2000年，編號43
Hugh Moss、Victor Graham 及曾嘉寶，《A Treasury of Chinese Snuff Bottles: The Mary and George Bloch Collection》，卷6，香港，2007年，編號1392

It is in overall good condition with the exception of one tiny chip to the outer footrim. There is also a barely visible minute chip to the ear of one dragon and the tail of the other.
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

A small group of porcelain bottles of this moon-flask form exists from the nineteenth century, with free-standing details as ‘handles’ on the shoulders and a flared foot with a reticulated band of decoration joining the foot rim to the lower body. They are always extremely thinly potted, with relatively narrow necks. One can be quite certain they are no later than the nineteenth century.

Three are in the Victoria & Albert Museum Collection, illustrated in White 1990, plate 118. They are decorated with enamels rather than underglaze-blue, but are obviously of the same group and produced almost certainly by the same pottery. Two were given to the Museum by Mrs. E. Mackworth Dolben in 1892; she may have owned them for a while before donating them. The delicate gold enamelling of all three shows signs of wear, one more than the other two, suggesting that they had been in use in China for some time before arriving in Europe. One can also trace the third bottle back to before it was given by Salting to the museum in 1910, since it is obviously the same one that appears in the Bragge Album (q.v. Moss, Graham, and Tsang 1993, no. 481, and JICSBS, Winter 2006); when the Bragge Collection was sold in 1876, this particular bottle must have passed into the Salting Collection. Bottles of this type were, then, in existence as early as the 1870s at the very least.

The style of high-flying details around the shoulders may hark back to export wares from the late eighteenth century. A pair of vases dateable to around 1785 with applied grape vines around the neck and shoulders may be an early manifestation of the style (Howard and Ayers 1978, no. 364). A monochrome, white-glazed example, with relief dragons but a foot similar to the present example is in Musée Guimet 1991, p. 11. A closely related bottle painted with a figure subject (and with an original porcelain stopper) is in the Princeton Museum of Art (Hughes 2002,no.237). Two blue-and-white examples, one with an apocryphal Yongzheng reign mark, are in Sin, Hui, and Kwong 1996, nos. 85 and 86, and an unusual iron-red and gold version, decorated with fenghuang medallions on each side, was in the Szekeres Collection (Sotheby’s, New York, 5 June 1987, lot 2).

One may be looking at bottles made in the first half of the century, then, although if one has an apocryphal Yongzheng reign mark they may not date earlier than the Daoguang reign.

All three in the Victoria & Albert Museum have a similar foot, although for the shoulder decoration, or ‘handles’, there are squirrels, complete with vines and leaves, rather than Buddhist lions.

The condition of many surviving examples demonstrates the impracticality of such delicate detail for an item in daily use and designed to be handled, passed among friends, and carried on the person. Most have had their relief ‘handles’ repaired to some extent, and the delicate, thin necks on some have been damaged. Given their unusual thinness and delicate relief detail, however, it is perhaps surprising that so many have survived at all.