Garniture of Five Hexagonal Pieces on Green Rolling Waves, Plate 1911

Plate 49 of the 1911 book Chinese Porcelain and Hard Stones, an original color plate of Chinese porcelain, illustrates a garniture of five hexagonal pieces, three vases with covers and two beakers, on a green rolling wave ground. The ground carries small flowers, white prunus and a row of symbols between rows of larger aubergine flowers, with lotus petal borders and double lotus bud knobs on the covers. The beakers have a projecting hexagonal middle band with symbols in aubergine and yellow. Gorer and Blacker describe them as late Ming or early Kang-he period and record them as from the collection formed by Sir William Bennett; vases height 12 1/8 inches (31 cm), diameter 4 1/2 inches (12 cm); beakers height 10 inches (25 cm), diameter 4 3/4 inches (12 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.

Folding line as issued. The left edge is uneven in one place. Even age toning. Handling soiling along the bottom edge. Foxing over much of the margin. Slight wear at two corners.

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