AN EXTREMELY RARE DOUCAI 'PEACH' BOWL YONGZHENG MARK AND PERIOD

superbly painted with a wide peach band comprised of three sections, each of two pairs of pale green, yellow and iron-red stippled  peaches hanging from a leafy bough centered with an iron-red peach blossom radiating leaves of varying greens, above a row of stylized, overlapping petals and a narrow band of descending blue bats alternating with foliate scrolls, repeated around the mouth rim, the interior with a central medallion of three further peaches and buds around a beribboned wan symbol, six-character underglaze-blue mark within a double circle

Collection of Dr. Richard and Mrs. Mary Eckhardt, acquired in Japan between 1947-1952 while Dr. Eckhardt was serving as a surgeon in the United States Army and thence by descent.

The bowl with a repaired triangular area at and below the rim comprised of several small pieces, extending into two long cracks running on either side of the base, with one reaching the rim on the other side. There is also a small chip to the rim with old Japanese gilt lacquer repair. The breaks have been cleanly put back together with some small areas of filled loss showing white.
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.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

A similar bowl, from the Meiyintang Collection, was sold in our Hong Kong rooms 5th October 2011, lot 14.  The catalogue states that no other bowl of that pattern with a Yongzheng mark was previously known, and the emergence of the present piece marks the appearance of what may well be the pair to the Meiyintang bowl.

Based on a Kangxi prototype, there appears to be only the aforementioned example and the present piece as the only recorded versions of this bowl created during the Yongzheng reign.  For a Kangxi example with differing, all underglaze-blue borders, see Sotheby's Twenty Years, Hong Kong, 1993 no. 251, which illustrates a bowl sold in our Hong Kong rooms, 27th October 1992, lot 167.  There are also two examples in the Palace Museum, Beijing, see Geng Baochang, ed., Gugong Bowuyuan cang Qingdai yuyao cigi [Porcelains from the Qing Dynasty imperial kilns in the Palace Museum collection], Beijing, 2005, vol. I, pl. 32, and The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum, Porcelains in Polychrome and Contrasting Colours, Hong Kong, 1999, pl. 202. Another pair of Kangxi bowls is published in Helen D. Ling and E.T. Chow, Collection of Chinese Ceramics from the Pavilion of Ephemeral Attainment, Hong Kong 1950, vol. II, pl. 104.