Black Hawthorn Beaker with Yellow Finches, Antique Color Plate, 1911

An original color plate of 1911 from Gorer and Blacker's book of Chinese ceramic art, this sheet is given over to a tall famille noire beaker marked Ch'eng Hua, known as a black hawthorn beaker. A large prunus with aubergine stems rises from green rocks, its branches covered with white blossom and a flock of yellow finches. The decoration is in three colors on the green washed black ground. Gorer and Blacker describe it as Ming period and record it in the Franks Collection, British Museum; height 27 1/4 inches (69 cm), diameter 10 1/2 inches (27 cm).

Edgar Gorer and J. F. Blacker brought out Chinese Porcelain and Hard Stones in 1911 through Bernard Quaritch, the New Bond Street bookseller, in an edition of one thousand numbered copies. The two volumes carry two hundred and fifty four color plates, each a full page photographic reproduction of a single piece or group, with a tissue guard and a facing description in English and French. The plates are color collotypes, and the book records that it was produced and printed by the Menpes Printing and Engraving Company of London and Watford.

The plates were made while large collections of Chinese porcelain were being formed in Britain and America, and the text names the collections that held many of the pieces illustrated, among them those of P. A. B. Widener, George Salting and Richard Bennett.

Even age toning. A few small foxing spots in the margin. All four corners complete. One larger brown mark.

This is an original antique print, not a modern reproduction. This item is sold unframed.