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Imperial Ming Jar Takes the £1.1m Biscuit at Bonhams Chinese Art Sale
http://www.bonhams.com/asian
AUSPICIOUS MING DYNASTY GOLDEN FISH JAR LINKED TO BRITISH BISCUIT BARON
SELLS FOR £1.1M AT BONHAMS
A splendid Ming dynasty jar, a rare survivor from a vanished era of
Imperial Chinese prestige, has sold for £1,117,600 in a packed sale at
Bonhams New Bond Street which made a total of £3.2m.
Created in the reign of the Emperor Jiajing (AD1522-66), and estimated
to sell for up to £250,000, the elegant understated blue and white jar
with highlighted goldfish, came from the collection of the Palmer
family, of Huntley and Palmer fame. This sale was without doubt a
highlight of London’s Summer Asia Week Chinese art auction sales.
The Chinese Art Sale, taken by Colin Sheaf, Bonhams Deputy Chairman and
Head of Asian Art, saw prices dispel any notion of economic gloom. The
items from the Palmer Collection performed exceptionally strongly with
many achieving ten and twelve times their pre-sale estimates.
After the sale Colin Sheaf said: “Items like this with impeccable
provenance, great rarity and the highest quality always seem to retain
their value and in fact grow it over the years. There is only a very
limited number of objects of this rarity and beauty available.”
The Palmer golden carp jar has remained with the family ever since its
first (and last) appearance at a London auction in 1935. One of only
very few remaining in public and private collections, this auspicious
jar generated such great interest because of its lustre, its Imperial
Chinese ownership, outstanding potting craftsmanship, freshness to the
auction arena, and provenance from an historically significant English
collection.
Golden carp fish were highly prized by Chinese connoisseurs during the
Ming Dynasty, both for their rarity, and for their association with
the images of great wealth and success. One 16th Century Ming Emperor of
China appreciated this subtle blending of imagery so much that he
commissioned porcelain to be decorated at the Imperial kilns with this
rare design, which he then ordered to be displayed in the palaces at his
capital, Beijing.
Painted in vibrant blue and gold, the jar will appeal to any of the
worlds great collectors of Chinese porcelain, mostly based in
Chinese-speaking Asia. Many of them know that designs on Imperial
Chinese porcelain often carry subtle allusions, and represent literary
messages to be understood by the cognoscenti. Here the association is
explicit: expensive porcelain, potted and painted to the exacting
standards of an Emperor, carries unambiguous images of wealth and
prestige. Even today, golden carp are carefully bred to maximise
the distinctive markings beloved of Chinese collectors. The colour gold
reverberates down the centuries, as an unmistakable statement that the
Ming owner of this jar was a man of the greatest financial substance.
Nothing is known of the early travels of this golden carp jar, until it
came to auction in England about four hundred years later. It was
always too expensive, too Imperial to be exported as part of the English
East India Companys annual shipments of Chinese goods, which
enriched British interiors over two centuries: Chinese export furniture,
lacquer, fans, wallpaper, and of course porcelain dinner and tea
services, flower pots, sets of mantelpiece vases. This jar was far
grander in conception and execution than any Chinese Export service
painted with a Western family's coat-of-arms.
Its recorded history in Europe begins in 1935, when it appeared at a
London auction from the famous collection of Charles Russell. Sold to
the best-known London dealer in Chinese art, Bluett and Sons, it entered
an equally famous English private collection in the same year for the
princely sum of £55.
This collection of Chinese porcelain and other art was being formed by a
leading British businessman, Reginald Palmer, chairman of the
internationally successful biscuits and cakes company Huntley and
Palmer. The factory was based at Newbury, Berkshire; and his large
country house, nearby, came to be liberally furnished with top-quality
Chinese art, especially porcelain and jade. This was increasingly
available to buy from London dealers, because the breakdown of Chinese
Imperial authority and the abolition of dynastic government in 1911 had
led to large quantities of Imperial Palace art being sold to the art
dealers of Beijing and Shanghai, and subsequently shipped to London.
Further information and images available from Julian Roup on 020 7468 8259 or email julian.roup@bonhams.com or press@bonhams.com
NOTES FOR EDITORS
Bonhams, founded in 1793, is one of the world's oldest and largest
auctioneers of fine art and antiques. The present company was formed by
the merger in November 2001 of Bonhams & Brooks and Phillips Son and
Neale UK. In August 2002, the company acquired Butterfields, the
principal firm of auctioneers on the West Coast of America and in August
2003, Goodmans, a leading Australian fine art and antiques auctioneer
with salerooms in Sydney, joined the Bonhams Group of Companies. Today,
Bonhams offers more sales than any of its rivals, through two major
salerooms in London: New Bond Street, and Knightsbridge, and a further
seven throughout the UK. Sales are also held in San Francisco, Los
Angeles, New York and Boston in the USA; and Switzerland, France,
Monaco, Australia, Hong Kong and Dubai. Bonhams has a worldwide network
of offices and regional representatives in 25 countries offering sales
advice and valuation services in 57 specialist areas. For a full listing
of upcoming sales, plus details of Bonhams specialist departments, go to
www.bonhams.com. (1st January 2008)
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