Bonhams 1793 : An Yixing stoneware water vessel Qing dynasty, signed Chen Mingyuan

27 May 2012 16:00 CST Hong Kong
Yixing stoneware and scholar's objects from private collections
Back to auction 20489

An Yixing stoneware water vessel

Qing dynasty, signed Chen Mingyuan
Of globular form supported on a short steeply rounded foot, the sloping sides rising to a flared neck, intricately moulded with a band of archaistic leiwen scroll and pendant blades, the centre of the base incised with a two-character kaishu mark, the clay of an attractive olive-brown colour.
7.4cm diam.

Sold for HK$ 500,000 inc. premium

Footnotes

Provenance:
Tan Jing (late Qing dynasty / early Republican period), by repute
Du Yuesheng (1888-1951), and thence by descent, by repute
I-Hsing Wares: Property from a Private Collection, Sotheby Parke Bernet, Hong Kong, 24 May 1978, lot 347

來源:
譚敬 (清末民初) (擬)
杜月笙 (1888-1951) 遺傳至其後裔 (擬)
香港蘇富比，I-Hsing Wares: Property from a Private Collection,1978年5月24日，拍品編號 347

Chen Mingyuan is a renowned figure in the history of the art of Yixing stoneware, although there are few extant historical records of his life. The dates of his birth and death are unrecorded, though current scholarship has come to a general consensus that Chen was active during the Kangxi/Yongzheng period (1662-1735), or as early as Shunzhi/Kangxi period (1644-1722).

Chen's artistic names are usually seen as hefeng, hecun, shixia shanren and huyin. His superb skill and craftsmanship has been extensively recorded in traditional Yixing connoisseurship. In Yangxian shahu tu kao, or A Pictorial Study of Yangxian Pottery Teapots (Li Jingkang, Zhang Hong, 1937:12), Chen's outstanding craftsmanship on teapots and scholar's objects is recorded as being comparable to that of Xu Youquan and Shen Ziche, whose skills were equally matched with their contemporaneous master, Shi Dabin. Extant examples of Chinese sculptures illustrate the intense interest in the production of objects for the scholar's studio and a great development of sculptural tradition at the end of the Ming dynasty. Chen Mingyuan of the early Qing was arguably the great successor and innovator of such development.

For a closely related example with Chen Mingyuan mark in the Yixing stoneware exhibition hall, see Yixing zisha zhenshang (Appreciation of Yixing Stoneware), Hong Kong: Joint Publishing Ltd. 1992, p.71.(fig.1)

清段泥摻砂仿古水盂

「鳴遠」楷書款

水盂口圓微微向外撇，器形上窄下寬，呈仿古式，肩飾回紋一周，下有倒三角仿古蕉葉紋，底部收平，微微凸起處成圈足，中間題「鳴遠」行書款;泥質細膩，整體古樸幽雅。

陳鳴遠，清康熙、雍正年間宜興紫砂名師，一說順治至康熙間人。江蘇宜興人上袁村人，生卒不詳。本名遠，號鶴峰、隺村、石霞山人，亦號壺隱。在宜興紫砂器歷史中，陳鳴遠是清初第一大家，也是時大彬後最富盛名的紫砂陶人。善作象生器，也喜作仿古器，塑鏤兼長，技藝精湛，善製新樣。其作品為多年藏家雅士之追求，如清．吳騫《陽羨名陶錄．家溯》有云：「陳鳴遠，名遠，號鶴峰，亦號壺隱。鳴遠一技之能，間世特出，自百餘年來，諸家傳器日少，故其名尤噪。」

宜興陶瓷陳列館藏一件回紋陳鳴遠小水盂，該水盂大小以及飾紋皆與本盂如出一轍，唯其盂底鈐「陳鳴遠」篆書印，見顧景舟編：《宜興紫砂珍賞》，三聯書店(香港)有限公司，1992年，頁71。(fig.1)