J.J. Lally & Co., Oriental Art / New York City, New York

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Past Exhibition

The Gordon Collection:
Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art

March 12 - April 4, 2009

59.
A JIZHOU TWIN PHOENIX STENCILED-DESIGN CONICAL BOWL

Southern Song Dynasty (A.D. 1127-1279)

decorated with a pair of phoenixes and two butterflies on the interior of the flat flaring sides, encircling a plum blossom motif on the small domed center of the bowl, the decoration all showing the dark brown glaze reserved against a variegated pale, cloudy-brown ground, the glaze draining from the rim to show a mottled golden brown color at the lip, the underside glazed dark brown and liberally splashed with cloudy brown mottling, the small circular ring foot of wedge-shaped cross-section and the flat recessed base left unglazed, showing the pale buff pottery.

Diameter 5 34 inches (14.5 cm)

A similar conical bowl decorated with this pattern recovered at the Yonghe kiln site near Ji’an, Jiangxi province is illustrated by Wirgin in Some Ceramic Wares from Chi-chou, B.M.F.E.A., No. 34, Stockholm, 1962, pl. 3a.

A similar conical bowl, with prunus blossoms instead of butterflies between the phoenixes on the interior, is illustrated by Mowry in Hare’s Fur, Tortoiseshell, and Partridge Feathers: Chinese Brown- and Black-Glazed Ceramics, 400-1400, Cambridge, 1996, no. 97, pp. 243-244, from the Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Myron S. Falk, Jr. Mowry explains in detail the innovative use of papercut stencils and resist-glazing to create the decorative effects on Song Jizhou wares.

Another similar conical bowl, also with prunus blossoms instead of butterflies, is illustrated in Song Ceramics from the Kwan Collection, Hong Kong Museum of Art, 1994, no. 172, pp. 380-381. Compare also the similarly decorated Jizhou teabowl of smaller size and different form, illustrated in Gugong Bowuyuan Cang Wenwu Zhenpin Quanji: Liang Song Ciqi, II (The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum: Porcelain of the Song Dynasty, II), Vol. 33, Hong Kong, no. 219, p. 239.

南宋  吉州剪紙貼花雙鳳紋碗  徑 14.5 厘米