A teadust-glazed double-gourd vase, Seal mark and period of Qianlong

Collection of Arne Schou-Sørensen (1877-1925), the Managing Director of Thoresen in Hong Kong in the early 20th century, and thence by descent.

First developed at the imperial kilns on the orders of the Yongzheng Emperor, the mottled olive-brown ‘teadust’ glaze was one of the many new colours for porcelain invented under the supervision of the great Tang Ying (1682-1756) during the Yongzheng and Qianlong reigns. Of auspicious double-gourd shape, the regal form of this vase is a delight to hold and finds its inspiration in the mythical flasks associated with Chinese Immortals.

Compare a closely related example in the National Palace Museum, Taipei, published in Illustrated Catalogue of Ch'ing Dynasty Porcelain in the National Palace Museum: Ch’ien-lung Ware and Other Wares, Tokyo, 1981, pl. 80; another from the National Museum of Chinese History, Beijing, included in the exhibition National Treasures: Gems of China’s Cultural Relics, Hong Kong Museum of Art, Hong Kong, 1997, cat. no. 70; a third from the Tsui Museum of Art, illustrated in The Tsui Museum of Art: Chinese Ceramics, vol. IV: Qing Dynasty, Hong Kong, 1995, no. 46, and sold at Christie’s New York, 16th September 1999, lot 366; and a fourth example, from the Meiyintang Collection, illustrated in Regina Krahl, Chinese Ceramics from the Meiyintang Collection, vol. II, London, 1994, pl. 938, and sold in our Hong Kong rooms, 5th October 2011, lot 1935.

Born the youngest of seven to a modest shipping family in southern Norway, Arne Schou-Sørensen (1877-1925) would soon rise to greatness as an international businessman and pillar of the European community in Hong Kong (Fig. 1). Starting work as a clerk for a company in Oslo, Schou-Sørensen’s ambition and talent for business drove him to explore opportunities lying further afield. Joining the Norwegian shipping firm Olaf Thoresen in Shanghai in 1904, he quickly rose through the ranks, was appointed as managing director in Hong Kong just five years later and even appointed as a board member of the Whampoa Shipyard; a title rarely conferred upon Europeans at the time.