Beschreibung:

A MAGNIFICENT AND RARE IMPERIAL TURQUOISE-GROUND UNDERGLAZE-BLUE AND COPPER-RED 'DRAGON' MOONFLASK, BIANHUQianlong seal mark and of the period The rounded flattened body vividly painted in a brilliant underglaze copper-red on each side with an Imperial front-facing five-clawed dragon encircling a flaming pearl, each surrounded by finely scrolling clouds painted in underglaze blue and above heaped waves releasing splashes of foam at the feet of each dragon, the slender cylindrical neck with a cloud scroll on each side and flanked by delicately curving handles painted with a band of classic scroll between two fine lines of underglaze blue, the body, foot and neck all covered in an unusual bright even-toned turquoise glaze precisely stopping at the outline of the underglaze painted decoration, the rim, the interior of the neck and the underside enamelled a soft lime-green, fitted box. 30.5cm (12in) high. (2).Footnotes清乾隆 松石綠地青花釉裏紅海水雲龍紋抱月瓶 青花「大清乾隆年製」篆書款 Provenance: Captain Charles Oswald Liddell (1854-1941, who lived in China from 1877 to 1913) and thence by descent Bonhams London, 7 November 2013, lot 36 The Huaihaitang Collection, Hong Kong Illustrated: The Liddell Collection of Old Chinese Porcelain, Bluett and Sons, London, June 1929, no.207 來源： 由Charles Oswald Liddell上校（1854-1941年）於1877至1913年旅居中國時獲得，並由家族繼承 倫敦邦瀚斯，2013年11月7日，拍品編號36 香港懷海堂珍藏 著錄： Bluett and Sons編，《The Liddell Collection of Old Chinese Porcelain》，倫敦，1929年6月，編號207 Please note that online bidding will not be available for this lot. If you wish to bid on Lot 38, Bonhams requires enhanced registration procedures. Please contact our Client Services Office by emailing info.hk@bonhams.com or +852 29184321. 請留意，網絡競投將不適用於本拍品。如閣下希望參與此拍品之競投，邦瀚斯將採用特別登記流程。請閣下通過郵件info.hk@bonhams.com或電話+852 2918 4321與邦瀚斯客戶服務部門聯絡。 The present lot can fairly be said to epitomise much of the stylistic achievements in porcelain production during the Qianlong period. From the smooth white body, perfectly formed in a softly flattened 'moon' shape, complemented by the delicate handles and perfectly proportioned neck and foot, to the strongly delineated deep copper-red five-clawed dragon emerging from dramatically rolling and splashing waves, and the technical perfection of the painting, enamelling and control of the glaze during firing, the vase embodies the Imperial style. As a symbol of the Emperor himself, the dragon is a most fitting subject for a vase destined to grace one of the halls of an Imperial palace. The moonflask is particularly unusual for the even turquoise glaze covering the ground but stopping neatly at the copper-red and underglaze blue painting. It appears that only one other 'dragon' moonflasks with this distinctive turquoise glaze is known, which was sold at Sotheby's Hong Kong, 20 May 1981, lot 775 and later offered at Christie's London, 16 December 1981, lot 96, and also illustrated by A.du Boulay, Christie's Pictorial History of Chinese Ceramics, Oxford, 1984, pp.212-213, no.5, and later sold again at Sotheby's Hong Kong, 8 November 1982, lot 175. Given the extreme rarity of this type of vase, it seems possible that the present lot would have been made as the pair to this example. Not only is the turquoise glaze of the present lot extraordinarily rare, but indeed only a handful of other 'dragon' moonflasks with a related coloured glaze appear to exist: one is the yellow-glazed example also acquired by Captain Liddell and included in the same Bluett's exhibition The Liddell Collection of Old Chinese Porcelain, Bluett and Sons, London, June 1929, no.207 alongside the present lot; and another vase with a lime-green-glaze formerly in the E.Chow Collection was sold at Sotheby's Hong Kong, The Edward T.Chow Collection, Part One, 25 November 1980, lot 151. This same vase from the E.Chow Collection was subsequently illustrated on the cover of M.Beurdeley and G.Raindre, Qing Porcelain: Famille Verte, Famille Rose, London, 1987. Besides these few examples of coloured-glazed 'dragon' moonf