A RARE LARGE CHINESE IMPERIAL ‘DRAGON’ BOWL

A RARE LARGE CHINESE IMPERIAL ‘DRAGON’ BOWL
SIX CHARACTER JIAJING MARK AND OF THE PERIOD 1522-66

The deep rounded sides rising from a slightly tapered foot to a wide flared rim, the exterior boldly painted in iron-red with two Imperial five-clawed dragons striding among stylized clouds in pursuit of flaming pearls. The dragons are painted in silhouette with details added in a deeper tone, one with open jaws, the other with a clenched grinning face, their sinuous scaly bodies issuing flames, all set amidst clouds scrolls, the rim and foot with line borders, the base with two paper labels for the Riesco collection 31.5cm.

Provenance: the collection of Mrs B Z Seligman, sold Sotheby’s, London, 11th May 1954, lot 48; later the R F A Riesco Collection, sold Sotheby & Co. 23rd June 1970, lot 48; the collection of Nicolas de la Mare Thompson (1928-2010).

Cf. A similar bowl in the Palace Museum, Beijing, is illustrated in Geng Baochang, Gugong Bowuyuan cang gu taoci ciliao xuancui, (Selection of Ancient Ceramic Material from the Palace Museum), vol.1, pl.156. Another from the collection of Nancy and Ira Koger, and later the Meiyintang Collection is illustrated by J Ayers, Chinese Ceramics, The Koger Collection, pl. 79, and by R Krahl, Chinese Ceramics from the Meiyintang Collection, vol. 4, no.1686; and another bowl of this design is in the Idemitsu Museum of Arts, Tokyo, illustrated in Chinese Ceramics in the Idemitsu Collection, Tokyo, 1987, pl.195.

For the prototype of this type of bowl, see one excavated from the waste heaps of the Ming Imperial kilns which was attributed to the Chenghua period, and included in the exhibition Yuan's and Ming's Imperial Porcelains Unearthed from Jingdezhen, Yan-Huang Art Museum, Beijing, 1999, catalogue no.317.

明嘉靖 礬紅趕珠龍紋撇口碗
《大明嘉靖年製》青花楷書款

來源：倫敦蘇富比， Seligman女士收藏，1954年5月11日·編號48。
R F A Riesco收藏，蘇富比1970年6月23日·編號48。
Nicolas de la Mare Thompson（1928-2010）收藏。Nicolas是朱湯生（1941-2011）的哥哥，朱湯生曾於1992-2003任職蘇富比亞洲藝術部主席。