A FINE PAIR OF DOUCAI CUPS WITH LANÇA CHARACTERS AND LOTUS MARKS AND PERIOD OF YONGZHENG

the steep rounded sides rising from a short tapered foot to a flared rim, finely painted in contrasting underglaze blue, red, yellow and green enamels within underglaze-blue outlines, with eight differently coloured lotus blooms interlinked with a thinly drawn foliate stem, each supporting a blue lança character, above a border of multi-coloured ruyi at the foot, the base inscribed in underglaze blue with a six-character reign mark within a double square

Regina Krahl, Chinese Ceramics from the Meiyintang Collection, London, 1994-2010, vol. 4, no. 1751.

One of the cups has a 2.3 cm horizontal body line under the glaze right above the footring. The pair is otherwise in excellent condition with very little wear to the enamels.
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

The doucai colour scheme became popular during the late Chenghua period (1465-87), when many new designs were developed, often for small vessels. The present design closely follows a Chenghua original, as can be seen, for example, on a fragmentary Chenghua cup recovered from the waste heaps of the Ming imperial kilns at Jingdezhen, Jiangxi province, included in the exhibition A Legacy of Chenghua: Imperial Porcelain of the Chenghua Reign Excavated from Zhushan, Jingdezhen, Tsui Museum of Art, Hong Kong, 1993, cat. no. C101; and a complete cup in the National Palace Museum, Taipei, was included in the exhibition Chenghua ciqi tezhan/Special Exhibition of Ch’eng-hua Porcelain Ware, 1465-1487, National Palace Museum, Taipei, 2003, cat. no. 168.

A similar pair of Yongzheng cups from the Edward T. Chow collection, sold in these rooms 19th May 1981, lot 562, is illustrated in Sotheby’s Hong Kong – Twenty Years, 1973-1993, Hong Kong, 1993, pl. 255; and a pair from the collection of Paul Bernat, now in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, is illustrated in Oriental Ceramics: The World’s Great Collections, Tokyo, New York and San Francisco, 1980-82, vol. 10, pl. 255.