Pair of Pheasant Figures on Splashed Rocks, Kien-lung Period, Plate 1911

Printed in color in London in 1911 for Bernard Quaritch, this original antique plate shows a pair of figures of pheasants standing on rocks splashed with various colors. Each red crested head has purple from beak to cheek running into a tiger stripe pattern on neck and back, the body is iron red, and the wing coverts are rich brown. The long wing and tail plumes have white quills over green and blue. Gorer and Blacker describe them as Kien-lung period and record them in the collection formed by Richard Bennett; height 13 1/2 inches (34 cm).

The sheet is a plate from Chinese Porcelain and Hard Stones, published by Bernard Quaritch in 1911, written by the London dealer Edgar Gorer with J. F. Blacker and printed in color by a photo mechanical process. The work ran to two volumes and two hundred and fifty four plates in an edition of one thousand numbered copies. 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.

In Chinese Porcelain and Hard Stones every piece or group is given a whole page to itself, so each plate is a complete image on its own, set in a wide margin, with the printed plate number as the only lettering on the sheet.

Even age toning. All four corners complete. One larger brown mark.

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