URNA med LOCK, porslin. Transition, 1600-tal.

Purchased from Sworders Fine Art Auctioneers, England, April 2009, Lot 130.

The Avalon Collection.

This collection, which in the main focuses on the Interregnum and Kangxi periods has been both carefully and sensitively formed over the last twenty-five years. The collector, a member of the English Oriental Ceramic Society, has assembled the collection with an eye for provenance whilst purchasing from old European collections, well-established antique dealers and at auction.

Academically, the pieces have been well researched both in terms of their symbolism and narrative themes. In many instances the imagery on the pieces has been referenced to episodes in the romantic and historic novels of Chinese mythology, which were used extensively in the decoration of seventeenth century Chinese porcelain.

A near identical example is illustrated in “Chinese Export Porcelain: From the Museum of Anastacio Gonclaves Lisbon”, by Maria Antonio Pinto de Matos, Page 158, Item 79 and “Later Chinese Porcelain” by R. Soame Jenyns, Plate II (1).

A similar example is illustrated in “ Chinese Ceramics from the Meiyintang Collection: Volume II”, by Regina Krahl, Page 147, Item 781.