Dragon Pillar Snuff Bottles

[richy88]

Hi John

Another beauty indeed.

It is almost identical to the one I have, except that mine does not have any crackle.

Thanks for posting.


Richard

[Joey Silver / Si Zhouyi 義周司]

Dear Richard,

    That is because your example is in hard-paste porcelain,
and John's is in soft-paste porcelain...

   Hard-paste porcelain is produced by combining Kaolin ['China'] clay with Petuntse,
a naturally occurring calcium carbonate compound. The Chinese discovered it in the late Tang Dynasty [!].
Incidentally, it took the Europeans till the 18th C. to replicate it, by burning cow bones to recreate that calcium carbonate compound.
Only 800 years later...

Soft-paste porcelain is produced by mixing Kaolin clay with 'frit' - a glassy substance that is a mixture of white sand,
gypsum, soda, salt, alum and nitre. Lime and chalk are used to fuse the white clay and the frit.
And the mixture then fires at a lower temperature than hard-paste porcelain.

Best,
Joey

[Wattana]

Another fine example - 2003 was a bonanza year for you!

Tom

[rpfstoneman]

All, finally did some better photography of 'An Hua' Dragon Pillar that in the 1st post of "100 Years of Concentric Rings".  That say it still difficult to get good pictures of the bottle. 

Porcelain Dragon Pillar Snuff Bottle:
Soft paste ‘An Hua’ decorated dragon pillar bottle of cylinder form.  Guan ware style glaze of brown stain crackles with finer white crackling between.  A highly detailed design of a 5-clawed imperial dragon with blue eyes incised onto the bottle body in white on white An Hua decoration.   A reduced ground bottle lip with a matched bone collar as support for a red glass stopper and ivory spoon.  Thirteen concentric ring unglazed base.  Height is 9.4 cm (3 3/4 inches) by 3.1 cm in diameter.   

An Hua (Chinese: 暗花; pinyin: ànhuā) is a term used in Chinese ceramics meaning secret or veiled decoration; the designs being visible through transmitted light, produced either by incising the design into the porcelain before glazing and firing or by delicate slip-trailing in white slip on the porcelain body.  It is also called "secret" or "hidden decoration".

Period: c.1780-1850, possibly Jingdezhen kilns.

Condition: Lip looks to have been ground down; a probable lip restoration repair. 

Provenance: Quinn’s Auction Gallery, 14 Mar 2014 Sale, Lot 413
                     The Humphrey collection, Houston, Texas.

Date Acquired: 05/17/2014

Charll

P.S.- This bottle does not transmit light when back lit or lit from the interior.

[Joey Silver / Si Zhouyi 義周司]

Dear Charll,

   A wonderful bottle and well catalogued, with one curious [OK, two! 'An Hue' - was it from Hue
in Vietnam?] mention: "...possibly Jingdezhen kilns."
It is almost definitely from the Jingdezhen kilns, since it is soft paste porcelain...
I don't know if there were porcelain kilns in the Imperial City Compound
producing soft paste porcelain works, and there could have been.
But I wonder if you meant 'the Jingdezhen Imperial Kilns'.
And again, I would say definitely. That is an Imperial five clawed dragon,
and the very large size notwithstanding I believe it was produced to be used
in one of the Imperial Palaces, not by the Emperor, but by one of the Princes/Eunuchs/etc.
EVERYTHING surrounding the Emperor and in the Imperial Palaces had to have a certain
level of Ritual Purity, thus everything had to come from sources with a high 'Kashrut' {ritual purity} level

While most people today don't have any concept like this, for Religious Jews like myself, it still has meaning,
though obviously not the same restrictions as  the Qing Court...
Best,
Joey

[bambooforrest]

Charll, great bottle! My similar example I posted earlier with the neck replaced with white nephrite [100mm].

[Fiveroosters aka clayandbrush]

Dear Charll,
very nice bottle! Surely soft paste because of the crackled glaze and especially for lack of translucency, as you said.
But there are a couple of points that I would like to mention. Anhua, for what I understand it, is only referred to incised, carved or impressed decoration, not for decoration made with a white slip over the glaze, which is known with the Italian words “bianco sopra bianco” (white over white). But, unless it is matter of pictures, the decoration on your bottle is impressed to me, not made with the bianco sopra bianco technique.
By the position of the shadows in the picture, the decorated areas look recessed, as resulting for pressing the mold.
I am less sure about the very nice bottle shown by John; the decoration there looks incised, but it could be impressed there too.
Am I right or is it mater of picture?
Govanni

[rpfstoneman]

 

decoration made with a white slip over the glaze, which is known with the Italian words “bianco sopra bianco” (white over white)

Giovanni, noted on the slip over glaze terminology.  I was just quoting what others had written in regard to An Hue.  Yes, it is more often the reference to an incised design that is glazed over.

Both John's and my bottle are incised with overglazing. 

Charll

[Joey Silver / Si Zhouyi 義周司]

Dear Charll,

   Both bottles, your's and John's, are incised with CLEAR overglazing.
And if it is Chinese, it's called 'An Hua' unless it's Annamese ware from Hue in Vietnam,
in which case it might be 'An Hue'... 
Best,
Joey