Precious Rituals from China and Vietnam

The perfect harmony between a cobalt-blue design and a metal frame—recognizable at a glance—evoked the works produced for the imperial city of Hué, just as the ladies playing Go brought to mind Chinese porcelain from the Kangxi era.

Selling for €61,100, a Chinese vase from the Kangxi period (1662–1722) with a so-called “scroll” shape, with a cylindrical body featuring a pronounced shoulder and green-family glazes, was fiercely contested due to its original decoration. It depicts elegant women playing Go and making music in lush gardens—scenes accompanied by poems and seals—while the neck is adorned with dragons (h.49, diam.20cm). Intended for the Vietnamese market, a rare porcelain water pipe known as“Hue blue,” dating from the Nguyen dynasty and the reign of Gia Long (1802–1820), was sold for 33,800€ (reproduced in Gazette No.21). Its iconic cobalt-blue decoration on a white background is adorned with five-clawed imperial dragons chasing the sacred pearl amid the clouds; the piece is crowned with the customary metal mount and its basket-handle. Back in China, an astonishing ritual pitcher known as a “kundika,” made of bronze with cloisonné enamel on a turquoise-blue background in the Ming style but dating from the18thcentury, sold for 22,100€. Its globular body is decorated with scrollwork and lotus flowers, topped by an angular spout with a removable lid. The piece rests on a dome-shaped base encircled by petals and scrollwork in chiseled gilded bronze. A four-character Qianlong mark is visible beneath the base (20.5×9.5x7cm, weight 467g). It was accompanied by an elegant mandarin necklace,priced at 17,550€, from the Qing Dynasty and circa 1820. It consists of a series of circular orange carnelian beads alternating with turquoise beads and four jadeite elements (lengthapprox.140cm).