A RARE CHINESE BLUE AND WHITE 'MAGIC FOUNTAIN' EWER

A RARE CHINESE BLUE AND WHITE 'MAGIC FOUNTAIN' EWER
JIAJING 1522-66

With a pear-shaped body raised on a spreading base, a tall hexagonal spout and a looping bracket handle, brightly painted in underglaze blue with a qilin supporting the basin of a fountain issuing water from phoenix and dragon-head spouts, the neck with plantain leaves, the foot with breaking waves, the base painted with a crouching hare within double rings, 32cm.

​Provenance: Field Marshal Earl Kitchener of Khartoum (1850-1916), and thence by descent through the family. This ewer is recorded in the Christie, Manson & Woods inventory at Broome Park, in December 1916 on page 39, where it is located in the Hall and described as ‘An ewer, painted with fountains in the Persian taste; early type. 13in. high’.

‘Magic fountain’ ewers are known in many international collections; there are several in the collection of the Topkapi Saray Museum, Istanbul, another in the collection of the Ardebil Shrine, and others in the Victoria and Albert Museum, the British Museum, the Grandidier Collection in the Musée Guimet, the Hamburg Museum and the Philadelphia Museum of Art. See also Christie’s London, 15th November 2000, lot 229, for another with 19th century silver Ottoman mounts.

明嘉靖 青花噴泉麒麟紋執壺
來源：霍雷肖•赫伯特•基奇納元帥（1850-1916），之後由其後人繼承。據佳士得Manson & Woods出版的， Broome Park庫存手冊中記載，1916年12月，頁39。