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So, the week before lock-down I was in London trawling Portobello Market and Kensington Church Street and stumbled across this in an Arabic/Asian gallery. The dealer had been told, and believed, it to be 18th century?! After a rather long, and somewhat protracted, negotiation I managed to acquire for nearly 40% of the asking price - perhaps an indication of how difficult and challenging market conditions were just before everything closed down ..?!
H. 32cm, MD 19cm, BD 21cm. Main body composition with four phoenixes, or two pairs, male and female with different tails amongst lotus scrolls. These are probably the Luan and the Feng, rather then the more commonly seen Feng and Huang types usually depicted ...
It has some condition issues. Long body crack, glaze pulls/losses to the mouth rim/base line, blue tone slightly pale and areas of ‘smokiness’ to glaze surface. This ‘smokiness’ is possibly due to a faulty glaze recipe, which may have been to thick, and probably also caused the interior running/pooling and edge losses to the mouth rim - 5th image. Such features are not common but are seen occasionally on such wares ...
This guan is early 16th C, ether late Zhengde or very early Jiajing periods - so 1515/mid 1520’s. The Gugong, Beijing has a guan/cover dated to Zhengde with similar, but not identical decoration - last image ...
Apart from the Gugong example, this guan appears to be extremely rare as no other example with this overall decoration seems to have been published or is known to be held within any public institutes/museum or private collection ...
It’s now in the hands of my restorer - so probably to be unseen again for several months ...!!
Stuart
That is lovely, Stuart! I shall look forward to seeing it after restoration is complete.
I have no idea what you were talking about re Luan and Feng, so I am off to do some research. Hope it will be ok to ask questions if I don't find what I am looking for? 😊
A stunningly beautiful example of an exceptionally rare guan. 👌
Mark
Nice! Congratulations!
What a find! It’s obviously a good time for makings bargains now.
Birgit
Hi Julia -
The Feng type is a male phoenix, with a tail depicted as seen in the first/third images posted and the Huang type is the more common female type, usually drawn with a curly tail. These two types have been seen on ceramics since the Yuan dynasty ...
The Luan type in the second/forth images, first drawn this way in the Xuande period, is also thought to be a female? However I understand that old Chinese texts state this is an entirely different ‘bird’ then the Feng and Huang phoenixes - so this ‘bird’ could be either male or female ...
Apologies, but I can’t seem to attach any images to this thread showing the differing types - don’t know if anyone else is having similar issues - so hope this explanation helps - somewhat ..?!🙄🤔
Stuart
Hi Stuart,
Thank you. I did read about the Feng/Huang and then got confused over the information I read on the Luan type. Interesting. More images would certainly be helpful and good to see but I think there was a problem earlier as I couldn't even access the site.
Julia
Hi Julia -
I emailed Peter earlier regarding my problems with attaching additional images to any posts, and the ongoing issue with 'button' access, and he kindly re-set my account🙂 ...
Unfortunately this reset has not cured the issues, so Peter has said he'll contact the site provider for help!!😒...
I've collated some wonderful images showing the differing types so will post these on a separate post in the next few days, if above 'issues' continue ...
Stuart
Thanks, Stuart. I will look forward to that! 🤗
Hi Stuart,
An amazing jar. I would find it hard to wait to bring it home! Thanks for sharing.
Re: the technical glitches here: I'm sure you've tried a different browser and/or emptied the history/cache? When I come across glitches like the ones you describe that usually does the trick.
Good luck!
Steve
Hi Steve -
As before, my pleasure to share ...
Re: technical issues - very much appreciated your advice on this but, unfortunately, have tried both and still ongoing?!🤨
I understand from some other Forum members that they are encountering same, or similar, issues!!🙄...
Stuart
Hi Stuart,
im new to this forum but have been collecting and studying for a while now. Please correct me if I’m wrong but this type of base was not used during the Ming period. The flat, slightly concave base occurred later during the 17-18th C. By this time this style of decoration hadn’t been done for a couple of hundred years and different styles were being used by the new generations of artists. Also, a guan jar of this type would have a very high price tag.
If I saw this piece for sale I would conclude it was from the second half of the 20th C, but this is only my personal opinion and I mean no offence by it.
best regards,
Hugh.
Hi Hugh - and welcome to this great forum ...
Absolutely no offence taken but I'am afraid your mistaken, the type of base seen/found on this type of guan is a typical for this period, late 15th/early 16th C ...
During the Ming dynasty, the bases on such large pieces were trimmed/finished differently during different periods, 14th - 17th centuries, also bases of such wares ordered/produced at the Imperial kilns differed from those made at the minyao kilns, such as this guan, where the differing grades of materials ie: clay, glaze, cobalt and production/craftsmanship ie: forming, painting, trimming, finishing and even firing very much depended on the level of patronage ...
I can only add that whilst very rare, the painting style and some of the decorative motifs are found/can be seen on other early 16th wares of differing forms and, when held/examined closely one can feel the imperfections of the body and see the slight differences within the motifs and overall drawing ...
You are quite right, an early 16thC guan with such rare decoration would be very expensive but, as mentioned above, the dealer had been told, and believed, that it was 18thC so negotiations commenced priced as such - rather fortunately for me ...
Stuart
It would be interesting to get Giovanni's or Peter 's view on this jar. What would concern me is that a dealer in the heart of the London antique world could have inquired and been told this was C18th when it clearly is not C18th style. Surely it's easy enough to check online.
I would also wonder slightly about the very prominent iron oxide line around the outside of the base rim, and the messy glaze on the interior rim. Are these really features of large (and potentially rare ) Ming pieces? I don't know enough about Ming porcelain to tell
tam
@ming1449
Thanks for the welcome Stuart, and thanks for the reply.
Im off to do more research on the subject of bases. Do you have any information yourself relating to these type of bases being used during this period? If I find anything useful myself I’ll let you know.
best regards,
Hugh
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