M5554

Chinese porcelain famille verte, large saucer dish with gently flared rim, painted with two seated ladies reeling silk beside a large open window in a covered building with thatched roof with a child watching on, another standing lady holding a candlestick beside a tearful child grabbing her robes while walking on a fenced path all within a walled compound, the base of the walls with crackled brickwork, the foreground with a stream of water, branches and rockwork, all in an evening scene beneath a new moon, stars, ruyi clouds and overhanging wutong branches, a forty-two-character, seven-column poem with an iron-red and gilt two-character seal and leaf mark. The base with a zhi, 'made' mark within a double square, all within a double ring in underglaze blue.

15 1/8 inches, 38.5 cm diameter.

Kangxi, circa 1700.

Chinese porcelain famille verte, wucai deep saucer dish, painted with the three friends of winter, sanyou, pine, prunus and bamboo in blue and yellow enamel peach shape reserves, all on a rich green ground painted as a large open leaf with a naturalistic margin, the underside as a stylised flowerhead, the base with a flower mark in underglaze blue within a double ring.

8 1/4 inches, 21 cm diameter.

Kangxi, 1662-1722.

Chinese famille verte biscuit porcelain water dropper, shuizhu, of a recumbent piebald horse on a green glazed leaf-form base, with head turned to the side beneath its long flowing segmented mane and forelock falling between the pricked ears, the front legs bent as if about to stand, covered on the body with dark brown enamel patches on a pale cream translucent ground, the back with open oval aperture, the tail and mane heightened in pale aubergine glaze, the bridle and hair to the small pastern heightened in yellow, the base unglazed.

5 3/4 inches, 14.6 cm long.

Early Kangxi, circa 1680.

Wood stand.