A copper-red 'double-phoenix' vase, fanghu seal mark and period of Qianlong

of archaic bronze fanghu form, the pear-shaped body resting on a splayed foot rising to a waisted neck flanked by a pair of elephant head fixed ring handles, the exterior painted in varying tones of copper-red on the front and back with a pair of swooping phoenix clutching a blooming peony in their beaks, all amid dense flowering and foliate peony scrolls, the sides decorated with a similar peony meander, all between ruyi lappet bands at the rim and base, the foot encircled with a pendent leaf band, the base inscribed with a six-character seal mark in underglaze-blue

Marchant and Son.

A copper-red vase of this shape and design, of Qianlong mark and period, is illustrated in The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum: Blue and White Porcelain with Underglazed Red (III), Shanghai, 2000, pl. 176.  Compare also further two Qianlong vases of this design from the Bruce collection illustrated in Soame Jenyns, Later Chinese Porcelain, London, 1951, pl. LXXXVI, fig. 2, each painted with the same decoration of phoenix and flowers, one in underglaze-blue and copper-red and the other in coloured enamels and underglaze-blue, both sold in our London rooms, 12th May 1953, lots 131 and 129, the latter now in the Bristol City Art Gallery.

A similar vase was sold in our London rooms, 12th June 2003, lot 183; and another in these rooms, 29th November 1978, lot 281.