Cocks and Chickens on a Pair of Chinese Bowls, Yung-ching Period, Plate, 1911

Plate 227 from Volume II of Gorer and Blacker's Chinese Porcelain and Hard Stones, an original 1911 color plate of a pair of egg-shell bowls painted with cocks, a hen and chickens on a stippled green ground, with a pierced incense burner. Bowls, a pair, egg-shell; and an incense-burner, cage for crickets, or receptacle for fragrant flowers. The bowls have fine decoration composed of several cocks, a hen and chickens, upon a stippled green ground, from which arise blue rocks and colored flowers; of the cocks, two on one bowl and three on the other have colored feathers upon a black body, with flowers and fruits in rich enamels. The incense-burner is spherical, having reticulated walls pierced in hexagons enclosing six panels. The book gives it to the Yung-ching period and records height 3 3/4 inches (9.5 cm); diameter 8 1/4 inches (21 cm).

Chinese Porcelain and Hard Stones, by Edgar Gorer and J. F. Blacker, was published in London by Bernard Quaritch in 1911 in two volumes with two hundred and fifty four color plates, and this sheet is one of them, from Volume II. The plates are color collotypes, a photographic process that reproduces continuous tone without a visible dot screen, which is why the glazes keep their depth on paper.

Edgar Gorer was one of the most visible dealers in Chinese art of his generation. He traded as S. Gorer and Son at 170 New Bond Street with a branch at 500 Fifth Avenue in New York, dealt chiefly in Kangxi, Yongzheng and Qianlong porcelain, and sold to Sir William Lever. He died on 7 May 1915 when the Lusitania was torpedoed, and his body was never recovered.

Hung as a group with other plates from the same work, it builds into a decorative scheme with a common palette and a common hand.

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

Even age toning. A few small foxing spots in the margin. Slight wear at the bottom left corner.