A RARE BLUE AND WHITE HANDLED DOUBLE-GOURD VASE SEAL MARK AND PERIOD OF QIANLONG

the well potted body applied with a pair of ruyi sceptre handles joining the upper and lower bulbs, delicately painted in the Ming-style in soft tones of underglaze-blue with simulated 'heaping and piling', the globular lower bulb decorated with a dense scrolling lotus meander below a ruyi head band and above upright lappets at the foot, the waist decorated with a raised band with leafy florets below a classic scroll border and above pendant lappets within raised borders, the upper bulb decorated with two lotus blooms on curling leafy stems, below a pendant trifoliate band at the mouth rim, the handles painted with a scrolling floral meander beneath the modelled ruyi-head terminals, the base inscribed with the six-character seal mark in underglaze-blue

It is extremely rare to find Qianlong vases of this small size.  A vase of this design and form, but of a larger size, was included in the Exhibition of Ming and Ch'ing Porcelain from the Collection of the T.Y. Chao Family Foundation, Hong Kong Museum of Art, Hong Kong, 1978, cat. no. 84, and sold in these rooms, 3rd May 1994, lot 174.  Compare another vase of this rare form, sold in these rooms, 19th May 1987, lot 274.

See also a related vase of the same shape, decorated with fruiting and flowering sprays, but with the mark and period of Yongzheng, in the National Palace Museum, Taiwan, illustrated in Blue-and-White Ware of the Ch'ing Dynasty, Book I, Hong Kong, 1967, pl. 5.