Vase, Meiping Shape, Kangxi period, 1662/1722

Inscription

in standard script on the base in underglaze blue in three vertical lines of two characters each: Da Qing Kangxi nian zhi (made in the Kangxi reign of the great Qing dynasty)

Provenance

Richard Bennett, Northampton, England; sold 1911 to (Gorer, London); (Dreicer and Co., New York, agent for Gorer, London); sold 1913 to Peter A. B. Widener, Lynnewood Hall, Elkins Park, Pennsylvania; inheritance from Estate of Peter A. B. Widener by gift through power of appointment of Joseph E. Widener, Elkins Park, Pennsylvania; gift 1942 to NGA.

Technical Summary

As with the other vases of this type in the National Gallery collection, the pale blue glaze thins at the edges of the neck and flaring foot, and along the neck ridge and on the two semicircular "ears" on the shoulder, and thickens and darkens in the adjacent areas. A rather large glaze pinhole can be seen at the upper part of the mouth, and a tiny glaze eruption appears along the neck ridge. A few dark spots and pinholes are scattered over the surface.

Bibliography

1911

Gorer 1911, 73, no. 366, repro.

1911

Gorer/Blacker 1911, 2:pl. 161, left and right of center vase, not differentiated.

1942

Works of Art from the Widener Collection. Foreword by David Finley and John Walker. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1942: 20.

1998

Bower, Virginia, Josephine Hadley Knapp, Stephen Little, and Robert Wilson Torchia. Decorative Arts, Part II: Far Eastern Ceramics and Paintings; Persian and Indian Rugs and Carpets. The Collections of the National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue. Washington, D.C., 1998: 81-83, color repro.

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