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Re: Found this vase sorting through family handmedowns -? Info

Posted By: Bill H
Posted Date: Mar 02, 2009 (09:31 PM)

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Mark,

The six-characters on the base of your pilgrim flask say "Made during the Qianlong Reign of the Great Qing Dynasty" (Da Qing Qianlong Nian Zhi), but that's about where the resemblance ends to porcelains of the period, which lasted from 1736-95.

From a technical standpoint, I think that period reign marks with everything in a row like this typically would have been written in Chinese seal carving characters called "zhuanshu." The URL below will get you to a website with a gallery of Qianlong marks for comparison.

From the stylistic standpoint, there are a couple of bothersome aspects. First, the handles seem anomalous compared to those on period pilgrim flasks I've seen. Further, the "Dragon admidst Flaming Clouds" motif on the side of your flask is poorly composed, leaving both the dragon and the cosmos over which he rules in a state of imbalance. Period porcelain painters were bound by artistic canon of the time to maintain symmetry and balance in their work. Not so those who copy them.

Regards,

Bill H

Link :ReignMarks

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