Olivia Xu
Associate Specialist
THE PROPERTY OF A LADY
女士藏品
女士藏品
Lot 324*
TWO LARGE FAMILLE VERTE 'LADIES' DISHES Kangxi
2 November 2023, 15:00 GMT
London, New Bond StreetSold for £44,800 inc. premium
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Chen Xie
Specialist
Edward Luper
Specialist, Chinese Works of Art
TWO LARGE FAMILLE VERTE 'LADIES' DISHES
Kangxi
The first, with rounded sides rising from a channelled foot ring to a slightly everted rim, brightly enamelled with three elegant Court ladies dressed in long flowing robes, seated by a table with some scholar's objects including an inkstone, two writing brushes, a brushrest, an incense burner and so on, all within a terraced garden setting, the base with a leaf within a double circle; the second, enamelled to the interior with an elegant lady peering out from the window of a pavilion, gazing at a lady and four young boys playing around in a terraced garden, the base with channelled foot and a ruyi within a double circle. The largest, 34.9cm (13 3/4in) diam. (2).
The first, with rounded sides rising from a channelled foot ring to a slightly everted rim, brightly enamelled with three elegant Court ladies dressed in long flowing robes, seated by a table with some scholar's objects including an inkstone, two writing brushes, a brushrest, an incense burner and so on, all within a terraced garden setting, the base with a leaf within a double circle; the second, enamelled to the interior with an elegant lady peering out from the window of a pavilion, gazing at a lady and four young boys playing around in a terraced garden, the base with channelled foot and a ruyi within a double circle. The largest, 34.9cm (13 3/4in) diam. (2).
Footnotes
清康熙 五彩仕女圖大盤一組兩件
Provenance: a Swiss private collection, and thence by descent
來源：瑞士私人收藏，並由後人保存迄今
In later Imperial Chinese society, women were largely confined to the home and were not encouraged to be educated. During the late Ming dynasty, however, against a background of social change and economic prosperity, some women managed to challenge these conventions. The famous late Ming philosopher Li Zhi (1527-1602) even declared in his ironically titled Book to be Burned that women were equally intelligent to men and took female students, much to general surprise. Celebrity courtesans accomplished in the genteel arts of music and literature entered male society, heralding a new model of feminine identity almost equal to the male literati. By The Kangxi reign, emerged a new ideal of accomplished females; see S.McCausland and Lizhong Ling, Telling Images of China: Narrative and Figure Paintings 15th-20th Century from the Shanghai Museum, London, 2010, pp.65-67. See also a related Kangxi vase depicting ladies engaged in the Four Elegant Accomplishments, in The Tsui Museum of Art: Chinese Ceramics IV, Qing Dynasty, Hong Kong, 1995, no.93.
A related famille verte 'ladies' dish, Kangxi mark and of the period, is illustrated by He Li, Chinese Ceramics: The New Standard Guide, London, 1996, p.302, pl.634.
See a related famille verte 'lady and boy' dish, Kangxi, which was sold at Bonhams London, 2 November 2021, lot 264. Compare also with a related famille verte 'ladies' dish, Kangxi, which was sold at Sotheby's New York, 15 March 2017, lot 530.
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