Lot 352
GILT-DECORATED BLUE AND WHITE 'MERIA SYBILLA MERIAN' BOTANICAL PLATE
QING DYNASTY, QIANLONG PERIOD, CIRCA 1740
Fine Asian & Islamic Works of Art
Auction: 3 November 2023 from 09:00 GMT
Description
清乾隆 約1740年 青花描金《瑪麗亞·西碧拉·梅里安》草蟲圖盤
painted in rich blue and heightened in gilding, the centre with two caterpillars crawling across a spray of exotic flowers and a butterfly hovering over them, flowers and insects painted with exceptional detail and very well-shaded, within a decorative dark blue band and an elaborate European style strapwork border, of which gilding still visible, the reverse painted at the rim with a trellis-work diaper, the rim with a brown wash
Dimensions
17.6cm diameter
Provenance
Provenance: Private collection, Norwich, England
Footnote
Note: This design is copied from a painting by Maria Sybilla Merian (1647-1717), a German-born engraver and painter of watercolours, who travelled extensively to the Dutch West Indies and made drawings for a book, Metamorphosis Insectorum Surinamensium, first published in Holland in 1705, then in France in 1771 as Histoire Génerale des Insectes de Surinam et de toute d'Europe. It has also been suggested that the rim border design, also derived from a European prototype and has been related to designs by Cornelis Pronk, a Dutch draughtsman working for the Dutch East India Company during this period. The origin of this composite design was discovered by Charlotte Jacob-Hanson, “Maria Sibylla Merian: artist and naturalist,” in the Magazine Antiques, vol. 158, no. 2, August 2000, pp. 174-183.
One slightly larger blue and white dish (26cm diameter) is in the collection of the British Museum, registration number: Franks.589, which was also exhibited in the National Museum of History, Taiwan, Ancient Chinese Trade Ceramics, Taipei, 1994, Catalogue, no. 80. A pair of very similar blue and white plates in Cohen & Cohen's collection was sold at Bonham's New York, 24 Jan 2023, lot 55. Another pair was sold at Christie's Amsterdam, 13 Dec 2012, lot 505 and a set of four was sold at Christie's London, 28 Apr 1999, lot 100.