A $4 Million Jade Spoon and Other November Chinese Art Auction Highlights at Sotheby's, Bonhams and Christie's Hong Kong

Wow, it's nearly the Christmas Holidays! My November and December went by so quickly with art-related business trips all around the world. I first went to Asian Art in London during the beginning of November, and this was followed by a quick return to Toronto so that I can help with telephone bidding for Heffel's major Canadian art auctions.

Towards the end of November, I flew to Hong Kong to check out the important Chinese art sales at Sotheby's, Bonhams and Christie's. In addition to displaying some of the top Chinese artworks this Fall season, each of these auction houses were impressing the public with their new locations and state-of-the-art gallery spaces.

There was some trepidation from industry insiders of a slowdown in the Chinese art market, but this Hong Kong series of sales saw numerous fantastic prices for higher end objects including Chinese Ming and Qing porcelain, jade carvings, Buddhist bronze sculptures and huanghuali 黃花梨 furniture.

1a. At their new space at Landmark Chater, one of the Chinese porcelain highlights of this Hong Kong trip was what Sotheby's described as a highly important and unique celadon-ground yangcai 'hunting scene' conjoined and reticulated vase, seal mark and period of Qianlong, possibly made in 1754. (Photo courtesy of the Sotheby's website)

This vase was simply incredible and definitely worth the 24-hour 'commute' from Toronto to Hong Kong. The conjoined vase has an even celadon glaze decorated with gilded lotus patterns throughout. There are three main reticulated sections that contains scenes of a colourful forest in famille rose enamels. More openings on the shoulders are in the shape of ruyi 如意 (longevity fungus) heads.

Within the reticulated forests, you can seen a porcelain core that depicts hunters on horseback chasing various animals. When you twist the top of the middle section, all three interior scenes will begin to rotate simultaneously!

During the 18th Century, these yangcai 洋彩 (foreign enamelled) types of revolving vases were the pinnacle of Chinese Imperial porcelain production. They were complex to fire because all the separate parts had to fit properly and decorated individually. The margin for error was very small.

Typical Chinese porcelain revolving vases required four separate pieces to be built and decorated, but in this case since there are three joined vases, eight separate pieces had to be constructed.

In addition to being in the Qing court records, this conjoined vase featured the following important provenance:

• Collection of Chang Foo Yau (1884-1963), Manager of Ton-Ying & Co., New York.

• Collection of William H. Whitridge (1849-1936), Baltimore, Maryland.

• Parke-Bernet Galleries, New York, 16th-18th November 1939, lot 171.

• Collection of a Chinese-American family.

• Christie's New York, 2nd December 1989, lot 383.

• '92 Beijing guoji paimai hui [1992 Beijing International Auction], 11th October 1992, lot 38.

• Acquired from the above, and thence by family descent.

This conjoined vase was hypothesized to be the final gift for the Qianlong Emperor by his Imperial kiln supervisor Tang Ying 唐英 (1682-1756). Tang Ying has already accomplished plenty during his illustrious career and designed all the yangcai wares for the Imperial court. So just two years before his death, he attempted to produce the most complex rotating vase ever imagined.

Image 1b. Here is a photo of myself with the Qianlong conjoined revolving vase. At this point of the day I was severely jet-lagged since arriving in Hong Kong the evening before. This photo was taken at about 4:30pm after a full day of auction previews on three hours of sleep. I was both relieved that I survived the day AND still had the opportunity to view this magnificent vase.

The conjoined vase was listed as estimate upon request, but it did realize a very high price realized of HKD 42.6 million (approximately CAD 7.63 million).

Image 1c. The base of the Qianlong conjoined revolving vase and its six-character reign mark in underglaze blue 大清乾隆年製 daqing qianlong nianzhi which translates to 'made during the Qianlong reign of the Qing Dynasty'.

Image 2. Another important piece of porcelain at Sotheby's was this impressive blue and white fruit bowl with Xuande mark and of the period (1426-1435).

This Ming Dynasty bowl was of a large size and the quality of the various fruits on the exterior, including pomegranates and peaches, were extremely well-painted in cobalt blue enamels.

From the photo, you can see the reign mark 大明宣德年製 daming xuande nianzhi which translates to 'made during the Xuande reign of the Ming Dynasty'. This bowl was part of the collection of reputable London Chinese art dealer Richard Marchant since the 1960's.

Because of the bowl's beautiful design and rarity, against an estimate of HKD 5/10 million it managed to sell for HKD 7.08 million (approximately CAD 1.27 million).

Image 3. The Sotheby's Chinese art sale also featured a large group of Chinese jade carvings, many of which were 18th Century vessels. One that I really liked was this pale celadon jade teapot and cover from the Qianlong Period (1736-1795).

The body of this teapot was carved from one large piece of jade. The exterior has a fine design of auspicious symbols including bats, chimes and fish, while the top has one of the largest inverted 'U' handles I have ever seen. The separate cover is also wonderfully carved with floral petals.

This Qianlong jade teapot and cover ended up selling for HKD 1.92 million (approximately CAD 305,000) which was within its auction estimate of HKD 1.5/3 million.

Image 4a. This Hong Kong trip marks the first time I visited the new Bonhams location at Six Pacific Place. Here, they featured numerous Asian art sales consisting of Chinese ceramics, works of art, classical furniture and Buddhist sculptures.

One of the most impressive pieces I saw was this very large blue and white 'seven sages of the bamboo grove' brushpot from the Chongzhen period (1628-1644) of the late Ming Dynasty.

The size of this brushpot is stunning and the quality of the decorations is exquisite. The story depicts a group of intellectuals, scholars, and musicians who fled political strife during the Jin Dynasty (265-420) to pursue the freedom of a literati lifestyle in quiet seclusion.

This brushpot came from the collection of Sam Marsh, a renowned British collector who built up a wonderful collection of Chinese art that consisted mainly of 17th and 18th Century porcelain with scholarly themes.

Estimated at HKD 4/5 million, this brushpot ended up realizing HKD 3.56 million (approximately CAD 630,000).

Image 4b. The base of this important Chongzhen blue and white brushpot with its old Marchant London gallery label and an Oriental Ceramic Society exhibition label.

Image 5. Bonhams in Hong Kong also had a wide array of Buddhist artwork on display in their 'Images of Devotion' sale. The highlight was this magnificent and large Chinese copper alloy figure of a dancing goddess.

This figure probably depicts Bhrikuti, a princess who was said to have brought Buddhism to Tibet during the 7th Century. She stands at an incredible 90 cm high and has so much elegance in this one-footed dancing pose.

This figure is dated to the Qianlong Period (1736-1795) and sold for HKD 6.354 million (approximately CAD 1.13 million) against an estimate of HKD 5/7 million.

Image 6. This trip to Hong Kong marked my second visit to Christie's new location at The Henderson. A few months earlier I showed up to their first series of sales where I saw the impressive Au Bak Ling Collection go to auction.

This November at Christie's Hong Kong saw many highlights with respect to Chinese furniture, archaic jade carvings, and Chinese porcelain.

The above display shows the impressive MQJ Collection that was offered on 29 November 2024. The owner of this collection is Grace Wu Bruce 伍嘉恩, one of the most important collectors of classical Chinese furniture over the past forty years.

Of the fifteen pieces she put up for sale, the two items with the highest realized prices were the large 17th Century huanghuali marble inset day bed, and just behind it, the 17th Century huanghuali plank top table. The day bed realized HKD 10.055 million (approximately CAD 1.88 million) against an estimate of HKD 3/6 million while the plank top table realized HKD 14.29 million (approximately CAD 2.55 million) against an estimate of HKD 2.5/4.5 million.

Image 7. Also at Christie's were some of the craziest prices ever seen for Chinese archaic jade carvings. The sale of the Lantien Shanfang Collection 藍田山房 drew hundreds of visitors from all around the world who were interested in this esoteric category.

This collection of 75 jade carvings completely sold out and realized over HKD 214 million (approximately CAD 38.29 million). The objects were mostly relatively small and included ritual ornaments, jewelry, animal carvings, garment accessories and vessels.

The jade carvings from the Lantien Shanfang Collection were purchased in the early 1990's under the guidance of famed jade dealer Chang Wei-Hwa 張偉華 and exhibited in '1999 Collectors' Exhibition of Archaic Chinese Jades' at Taiwan's National Palace Museum in 1999.

The line up to view all these jade pieces was immense, so this was one of the few instances where I wasn't able to personally examine something at auction. However, I really did gravitate towards the above 'spoon', which is in fact a very rare white jade dragon-head ladle from the Late Western Han to Eastern Han Dynasty (Circa 86-220 AD). (photo courtesy of the Christie's website)

The pure white colour of the stone is simply breathtaking and the quality of dragon head is exquisite. At 16.8 cm long, this is also one of the largest jade ladles recorded from the Han Dynasty.

The white jade ladle was conservatively estimated at HKD 500,000/800,000 but after a lengthy bidding battle, ended up selling for HKD 22.155 million (approximately CAD 3.95 million).

Image 8a. The crowd situation was much calmer at the porcelain section of the Christie's Chinese art preview. There was a great selection of porcelain pieces from the Palmer Collection and one of the most interesting objects was this famille rose 'butterfly and flower' rectangular teapot.

This teapot was given a general dating to the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) and its estimate of HKD 200,000/300,000 confirmed this attribution.

However, because of the teapot's Palmer Family provenance, its extensive publication history, and the fact it was acquired from famed dealer Yamanaka & Co in 1937, many people believed this vessel to have been an 18th Century example. The quality of the painting is extremely fine too!

Consequently this famille rose teapot sold for many times its low estimate to realize an astounding HKD 7.308 million (approximately CAD 1.3 million).

Image 8b. The base of the famille rose teapot has a rare four-character mark of 保和太和 baohe taihe, which translated to 'pursue and preserve the perfect harmony'.

Image 9a. Another wonderful porcelain item I liked from the Palmer Collection was the famille rose 'hibiscus and dragonfly dish' with Yongzheng mark and period (1723-1735). The quality of the design is simply gorgeous, and the immaculate floral design extends to the reverse of the dish. If I were to take an item from this blog home with me, it would have been this little dish.

Its estimate was slightly aggressive though at HKD 5/8 million, but the famille rose dish still managed to sell for HKD 4.41 million (approximately CAD 790,000).

Image 9b. The base of the famille rose dish's six-character reign mark in underglaze blue 大清雍正年製 daqing yongzheng nianzhi which translates to 'made during the Yongzheng reign of the Qing Dynasty'. You can also see how the design on the front continues to the reverse.

Image 10a. The main 'Important Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art' sale at Christie's offered more exciting pieces of Chinese porcelain.

One of the most intricate was this famille rose and doucai 'pomegrante' tazza with Qianlong mark and of the period (1736-1795). The painting of this tazza is extremely refined with its combination of famille rose and doucai 鬥彩 enamels. The top contains groups of attached porcelain pomegranates that look quite realistic!

This tazza would have been part of a garniture set for a Buddhist altar within the Qianlong court. With an estimate of HKD 1.2/2.4 million, it sold for HKD 4.032 million (approximately CAD 720,000).

Image 10b. The base of the Qianlong altar ornament and its six-character gilt reign mark 大清乾隆年製 daqing qianlong nianzhi which translates to 'made during the Qianlong reign of the Qing Dynasty'.

Image 11a. And my last highlight from Christie's Hong Kong is a rare blue and white 'immortal' bowl with Xuande mark and of the period (1426-1435).

This Ming bowl was exhibited with Taiwan's prestigious Ching Wan Society's twentieth anniversary in Taipei and depicts a scene of a female immortal riding a phoenix to meet another immortal waiting in a heavenly pavilion.

The quality of the bowl's painting is extremely beautiful and it is unusual to have figures displayed on Xuande bowl's of this type. This 'immortal' bowl ended up selling for a strong HKD 30.625 million (approximately CAD 5.5 million) against an estimate of HKD 25/35 million.

Image 11b. Detail of the female immortal riding a phoenix.

Image 11d. The base of the blue and white bowl and its six-character reign mark 大明宣德年製 daqing xuande nianzhi which translates to 'made during the Xuande reign of the Ming Dynasty'.

Image 12a. And a trip to Hong Kong usually means that I have to visit Luk Yu Teahouse 陸羽茶室 in Central. Established in 1933, this famous spot is currently Hong Kong's oldest restaurant.

Luk Yu spans three floors and the interior is decorated in an Art Deco colonial style. The walls are filled Chinese Republican Period antiques and paintings by famous artists. And they serve some of the best traditional dim sum I have ever had!

This restaurant is filled with regulars so booking a spot can sometimes be difficult, especially at lunch time. During the Chinese art auction season, many collectors, dealers and auction house specialists will gravitate at Luk Yu, so you will always see familiar faces.

Image 12b. Here are some of the dim sum classics during my 9:30am breakfast at Luk Yu Teahouse. I was spending the morning with a well-known Chinese art auctioneer and two international Chinese art consultants.

Hope you all enjoyed this current blog! I will be heading out to Montreal shortly to work on two potential consignments for my next Heffel auction, and then heading to New York to view the new blockbuster Himalayan art exhibition at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. After that I can hopefully relax for a couple of weeks (and finish up various Asian art appraisal and valuation reports!) before heading out to Vancouver to start 2025. Please keep following me on my Instagram feed @anthonywuart to catch the latest news of my Asian art adventures!