A rare enamelled glass 'phoenix' Vase mark and period of Qianlong

of Guyuexuan type with an ovoid body surmounted by a flared neck, delicately painted in the famille-rose palette with a long-tailed phoenix perched on pierced rockwork amidst leafy sprigs bearing flowering pink and yellow peony blooms extending around the sides, the neck encircled by tasseled beaded garlands suspended from a ruyi band and frieze of keyfret around the raised lip, the slightly countersunk base with a rubbed six-character mark in iron red

Sotheby's Hong Kong, 2nd May 1995, lot 203.
Sotheby's Hong Kong, 4th November 1997, lot 1246.

A bottle with very similar enamelling but with a cylindrical neck and a guyuexuan mark, sold in these rooms 29th November 1978, lot 420, and now in the collection of Robert H. Clague, was included in the exhibition Chinese Glass of the Qing Dynasty 1644-1911, Phoenix Art Museum, Phoenix, 1987, cat.no.50; and one painted with flowers is illustrated in Hugh Moss, By Imperial Command, Hong Kong, 1976, pl.43.

This group of enamelled glass is discussed by Hugh Moss in  'Enamelled Glass Wares of the Ku Yueh Hsuan Group', Journal of the International Chinese Snuff Bottle Society, June 1978, vol.X, no.2, pp.5-25; and by Hugh Moss, The Art of the Chinese Snuff Bottle, The J&J Collection, vol.I, New York, 1993, pp.331-338.

See a glass vase painted with flowers and birds illustrated in Luster of Autumn Water. Glass of the Qing Imperial Workshop, Beijing, 2005, pl. 84; and another pair of vases also painted with the flower and bird design, in the Corning Museum of Glass, New York, included in Emily Byrne Curtis, Pure Brightness Shines Everywhere, Aldershot, 2004, pl. 9.10.