RARE CHINESE EXPORT BLACK-GROUND "TRUMPETER" WASTE BOWL
Early Qianlong, c1740
The exterior painted on each side with 2 Moors on a grassy mound, dressed in Ottoman style - one
wearing a yellow robe and playing a circular horn facing away from the other in turquoise, playing a trumpet
suspending a yellow standard, within gilt spear-head and spaced lozenge bands, the spear-head band repeated
at the footrim, reserved against a black ground, the interior with a gilt floral sprig. The more complex border
denotes that this version is likely from the “first order”*.
Cf. D. Howard and J. Ayers, op.cit., vol.1, no.299, p.305, for a bowl with this design, where the authors
suggest that the figures are wearing Ottoman costumes and that this was undoubtedly a specially commissioned
design, since the shapes of pieces are those of tea-services used in England and the Continent c.1740, and that
it illustrates music played 'eastward of the Levant'. They discuss the possibility that the design may have been by
Cornelis Pronk. A number of pieces with slight variations of the rim design are known, some also with thicker enamel.
A coffee cup and two saucers in the Hodroff Collection, illustrated by D. S. Howard, op.cit., no.202, p.178 show
two rim variations. *Mr. Howard suggests that the cup and saucer with more elaborate rim decoration, which also
have thicker black enamel, may well represent a “first order”. Due to the expense of producing this service,
economies in decoration were made on subsequent orders, as shown in a second saucer with only spearhead borders.
Museums and literature for the rare “Trumpeter” pattern include: Brussels Royal Museums of Art and History
Exhibition (teabowl & saucer), Chinese Export Porcelain, Hong Kong, 1989-1990, Catalogue, no. 55; Museum
Boymans van Beuningen, Rotterdam, (a plate) with illustration by F. & N. Hervouët et Y. Bruneau, op.cit., p.191,
no.8.20, and (similar plate) ibid. no. 8.21; Ionides Collection (a teabowl and saucer) was included in the exhibition
Ancient Chinese Trade Ceramics from The British Museum, Taibei, 1994 Catalogue, no.79, pp.184 and 185); (
milk-jug and cover) illustrated by D. F. Lunsingh Scheurleer, op.cit., fig. 92; (
a teapot) Elvehjem Museum of Art, Wisconsin, illustration #74, p. 100
Condition : Excellent; good enamels and gilt; the rim slightly our of level; a reinforced firing flaw to the footrim
2 5/8" x 4 5/8"
SOLD
#6080
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Side 1 |
Side 2 |
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Verso Side |
Side 4 |
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Interior |
Footrim |
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