Pair of Ho Ho Erh Hsien Mounted on Kilins, Antique Color Plate 1911

An original antique color plate from Chinese Porcelain and Hard Stones, London, 1911, this sheet shows a pair of figures of the Ho Ho Erh Hsien, twin gods of union and harmony, each riding a kilin. Each holds a yellow ju-i scepter, one with a sheng mouth organ and the other ink and a brush, together a rebus for "May it be as you wish." The kilins have green scaled bodies with iron red flames, red mouths and yellow horns. Gorer and Blacker describe them as late Ming or early Kang-he period and record them in the collection of Henry Hirsch; height 9 3/8 inches (24 cm), width 7 1/4 inches (19 cm).

Chinese Porcelain and Hard Stones appeared in 1911 under the imprint of Bernard Quaritch, 11 Grafton Street, New Bond Street, London. Edgar Gorer and J. F. Blacker illustrated two hundred and fifty four pieces across two volumes, every one of them given a full page color plate printed from a photograph. Volume I, from which this sheet comes, runs from Plate 1 to Plate 135. 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 printed in color from photographs of the pieces, so the black and green grounds, the iron red and the white of the porcelain are recorded directly rather than drawn by an artist. A plate from this book reads as a record of an object rather than as a decorative picture of one.

Even age toning. Scattered light foxing in the margin. All four corners complete. Several larger brown marks.

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