An associated pair of Chinese doucai 'lotus and chrysanthemum' jars

Qing dynasty, Qianlong seal marks and of the period

Each jar finely painted in underglaze blue and enamelled in iron-red, yellow and green enamels with roundels of chrysanthemum flower heads, interspersed with leafy lotus meanders, the blue outlines carefully filled out, all between underglaze blue ruyi borders at the shoulder and rim, the six-character seal mark in underglaze blue to the base, each 11.5cm high (2).

清乾隆 鬪彩番蓮團菊紋罐兩隻，青花篆書「大清乾隆年製」款

As often the case with doucai-enamelled Imperial porcelain of the 18th century, the design of the present lot is inspired by a Chenghua prototype, such as the jar with butterflies and chrysanthemum roundels in the Qing Court Collection, illustrated in Porcelains in Polychrome and Contrasting Colours, The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum, Hong Kong, 1999, pl. 166. No exact prototype can be found for this design, but the pattern is known in bowls, an example of which was excavated from the waste heaps of the Ming imperial kilns at Jingdezhen and included in the exhibition A Legacy of Chenghua, The Tsui Museum of Art, Hong Kong, 1993, cat. no. C119. 

A pair of jars of the same design, but with their lids, was sold at Sotheby's London, 3 November 2021, lot 143; another pair at Christies Hong Kong, 27 November 2013, lot 3209. A pair of jars of this design is in the Tianjin Art Museum, included in the exhibition Chinese Treasures of 5000 Years, Japan, 1985, Catalogue, no. 46; another pair was included in the exhibition Min Shin no Bijutsu (The Art of Ming and Qing), Osaka City Museum of Fine Arts, 1980, Catalogue, p. 43, no. 1-192.