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PROPERTY FROM A WEST COAST COLLECTION
Lot 29
A RARE CLARE-DE-LUNE-GLAZED 'RUYI' MEIPING Kangxi six-character mark and of the period
15 September 2025, 09:00 EDT
New YorkSold for US$102,100 inc. premium
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A RARE CLARE-DE-LUNE-GLAZED 'RUYI' MEIPING
Kangxi six-character mark and of the period
Rising elegantly from a flared base and circular foot rim to the high-set shoulders framed by a small, double bowstring neck and two low-relief 'C'-scroll accents below, the surface covered with an unctuous pale blue glaze pooling slightly at the neck, stopping neatly above the foot, the six-character mark on the recessed base.
8 1/4in (21cm) high
Rising elegantly from a flared base and circular foot rim to the high-set shoulders framed by a small, double bowstring neck and two low-relief 'C'-scroll accents below, the surface covered with an unctuous pale blue glaze pooling slightly at the neck, stopping neatly above the foot, the six-character mark on the recessed base.
8 1/4in (21cm) high
Footnotes
清康熙 《大清康熙年製》楷書款 天藍釉刻雙如意耳梅瓶
Provenance:
Collection of Philip Cardeiro (1930-2014)
來源：
Philip Cardeiro（1930-2014）收藏
Elegantly potted, the present vase is remarkable for its refined silhouette and perfect proportions with the full, rounded shoulders tapering gracefully to a spreading foot. Known as meiping or 'plum vase,' this traditional form was so named because its narrow mouth is ideally suited for holding a single branch of plum blossoms. The shape became particularly popular during the Song and Liao dynasties, and continued well into the Ming and Qing periods, where it remained a favored vessel in both court and scholar settings.
The combination of the understated meiping form with its ridged neck and foot, delicately carved ears, and luminous glaze is particularly refined. Known in the West by the 19th-century French connoisseurs' term clair-de-lune ('moonlight'), and in China as tianlan ('sky blue'), this pale bluish glaze that contains approximately 1% cobalt was first developed during the Kangxi Emperor's reign, and soon became one of the most admired monochrome finishes produced then.
The pairing of the graceful meiping form with the ethereal clair-de-lune-glaze continued to be celebrated in later periods, and is well represented in Giuseppe Castiglione's court painting Wurui Tuzhou (Dragon Boat Festival) (Fig. 1), commissioned by the Yongzheng Emperor and now in the Qing Court Collection. In the scene, a similar vase is depicted holding a delicate floral arrangement, a testament to the enduring appreciation of this form and glaze within the Imperial Court.
A few vases with this elegant combination of shape and glaze have been published. See two in the Qing Court Collection, one illustrated in Geng Baochang, Gugong Bowuyuan cang Qingdai yuyao ciqi (Porcelain from the Qing dynasty Imperial kilns in the Palace Museum), Beijing, 2005, vol. I, pt. II, pl. 116, and the other in The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum, Monochrome Porcelain, vol. 37, Hong Kong, 1999, p. 94, no. 87. A pair in the National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC (accession no. 1942.9.495 and 1942.9.496), is included in Virginia Bower, et al., Decorative Arts, Part II: Far Eastern Ceramics and Paintings; Persian and Indian Rugs and Carpets. The Collections of the National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue, Washington, D.C., 1998: 81-83. One in the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco is in He Li, Chinese Ceramics, New York, 1996, p. 279, no. 541.