A CHINESE FAMILLE VERTE BISCUIT MODEL OF LI BAI

KANGXI 1662-1722

The famous poet wears a voluminous green robe, decorated with large butterflies and civil rank badges, he slumbers beside a large wine pot formed as a peach and moulded with leaves, his eyes closed and his hair arranged in two topknots, with a paper label for Berwald, London, to the base, 20cm.

Li Bai, the celebrated Tang Dynasty poet, was famed for his excessive consumption of wine. He allegedly drowned in 726 A.D. after leaning over the edge of a boat in a drunken effort to embrace the reflection of the moon.

Provenance: formerly in the collection of Baron Fould-Springer, Royaumont Abbatial Palace, France, later from a British private collection, purchased from Berwald Oriental Art Ltd., 5th November 2003. A copy of the invoice is available.