A large and rare famille-noire yen yen vase Qing Dynasty

the baluster body surmounted by a cylindrical neck flaring to an everted rim, with magpies in flight and perched on the branches of a flowering prunus, the gnarled trunks in aubergine accented with white whorlbands, emerging from green and turquoise rocks alongside stands of bamboo, the white prunus blossoms in luxuriant clusters, all reserved on a black ground, the mouth rim glazed white and painted with branches of green blossoms, the base with an apocryphal Chenghua mark, stand.

Estate of Martha Baird Rockefeller, 1971

Compare with the vase with similar treatments of prunus branch illustrated in Suzanne Valenstein, A Handbook of Chinese Ceramics, 1989 ed., p. 225, no. 218.

The mate to this vase is illustrated in Bushell and Laffan, 'Catalogue of the Morgan Collection of Chinese Porcelains,' 1907, case I, no. 16, pl. XLVIII.