這件華麗的鈞窯花口尊傳承顯赫，有著平野古陶軒和徐展堂的收藏傳承，雖然品項有一點瑕疵，但作為頭部質量的宋瓷應該可以接受；可惜彼時此番定價與當時市場的認知還有些許偏差，最後並未能成交。
這件作品的造型，磁州窯鉅鹿縣類型也有相同樣式，可惜直至今日也被大規模忽略。實際上此類作品應該是宋金時代的造型，特殊的比例也讓我們得以窺探宋時代包容、高古的審美。
估價
500,000 - 700,000 GBP
15 五月 2019 • 倫敦
30.2公分，11 7/8英寸
來源
紐約蘇富比1986年6月4日，編號45
平野古陶軒，東京
徐展堂私人收藏（參考號SJ1）
紐約蘇富比2012年9月11至12日，編號131
展覽
徐氏藝術館，香港
出版
《徐氏藝術館》，香港，1991年，圖版39
品相
此尊略有傾斜, 有幾處噴塗痕跡, 均於紫外燈下可見: 花形口沿其中三瓣; 頸底部合縫線處及球身底部凸起處。此尊釉色艷麗均勻, 有些許輕微開片, 圖錄顏色比實物略淺。
左為徐展堂先生，右為鄧永鏘爵士
平野龍治、平野龍夫
鈞窰華器 康蕊君
本尊器形華麗攝人，綜合凹、凸及圓錐線條，尊口波紋起伏，戲劇感強烈，乃元朝之前最繁複而令人難忘的鈞窰瓷器器形。此型接近幾何構造，非屬瓷匠典型設計，然而亦無明顯之金屬器形可溯。此尊塑形甚難，然而北方各窰均有仿效製作，故可推斷此器於當時深受推崇。
鈞窰釉豐厚而不透明，與本尊雅凈線條正屬良配，而鈞窰瓷口沿處多為釉薄呈褐色邊，此尊花口，兩色對比分明，甚為奪目。如本品般製作精巧之早期作例極其珍罕，然而此款五瓣花口尊續製於鈞窰及其他各窰直至元代。此款尊後期多帶尊耳、底座及紫斑，比較一著名作例，出土自北京元代遺址，尺寸龐大，乃壇前供器，載於《中國陶瓷全集》，上海，1999-2000年，卷10，圖版205。本品可能亦曾屬供器，然而花口下卷，用作斟注酒水同樣極為適合。
黒釉堆線文百合口瓶 磁州窯 公益財団法人 東京富士美術館 高33.6cm、径14.7cm
花口、菱口及器身呈波浪形之瓷器常見宋代，多可溯源至同期銀器，然而本尊則無典型銀器或金屬器雛本可循，其源或來自軟土塑形之器。此外，本尊靈感亦可能來自仿荷葉形之宋代瓷器，取其高低起伏之態，戲劇效果更為強烈。比較一金屬器作例，鎚打銅鎏金瓶，線描圖載於Bo Gyllensvärd，<‘T’ang Gold and Silver’>，《Bulletin of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities》，編號29，斯德哥爾摩，1957年，圖38d。現時研究尚未確定此類花口來源何屬，唯可參考一馬石石刻例，石刻刻劃一盤，花口與本尊相近，盤中盛載鮮花，出土自宋仁宗墓（1023-1063年在位），見《北宋皇陵》，鄭州，1997 ，頁171，圖150: 1。
本尊器型獨特、比例均稱，極其珍罕，僅有一例可比，出自關善明收藏，曾展於《歷代文物萃珍：敏求精舍三十週年紀念展》，香港藝術館， 香港， 1990年， 編號101，售於倫敦蘇富比2003年11月12日，編號50。
此器型流行於附近各窰，其中以河南及河北省瓷窰為主：比較一定窰例，器型相近，尺寸遠較本品為小，現藏於河北省定州市博物館；一件三彩例，器型及尺寸與本品非常相近，現藏於北京首都博物館，圖載於各出版，如《中國陶瓷全集》，前述出處，卷9，圖版159及227。此外，三例載於三上次男編，《世界陶磁全集》，卷13：遼、金、元，東京，1981年，彩圖92、276、283，分別為一件繪花磁州例，尺寸龐大，器型與本品相同，現藏於西雅圖藝術博物館；東京出光美術館收藏一三彩例；一件黑釉例，器型於本品相近，腹部環施白色護胎土條紋。西雅圖例以及數件黑白彩、綠釉或黃釉磁州例同載於Yutaka Mino，《Freedom of Clay and Brush Through Seven Centuries in Northern China: Tz'u-chou Type Wares 960 - 1600 A.D》，印第安納波利斯美術館，印第安納波利斯，1980年，圖版77、78、96及圖206-9及279。再比一例，光素無釉，繪大理石紋，出自Eugene Bernat收藏，曾展於《Loan Exhibition》，波士頓美術博物館，1947年，編號42，曾售於紐約蘇富比1980年11月7日，編號129。
此外尚可比較其他窰瓷作例，如陝西耀州或江西景德鎮，花口與本品相近，鼓腹，器身線條較本品連貫，見《宋代耀州窰址》，北京，1998年，頁292，圖148: 3 及4；頁294，圖149，彩色圖版8，圖3，圖版77，圖6，圖版78，圖1及2；及長谷部楽爾，《世界陶磁全集·宋》，東京，1977年，彩色圖版32。
鈞窰器，製於河南各窰，如鶴壁、安陽、淇縣、郟縣、新安、扒村、禹縣及臨汝，以至河北磁州及隆化等，見於《故宮博物院藏中國古代窰址標本》，卷1：河南卷，北京，2005年及卷2，河北卷，北京，2006年。上述各窰，多於元朝及以後方始根據鈞窰風格製器，而禹縣則屬鈞窰燒造中心，其中曾有大量個別瓷窰出土。 鈞窰瓷之原型，即於此地發展而成，鑒藏界視之為宋代五大名窰之一。比較一例。尊口與本品非常相近，出土於禹縣劉家門窰址，前述出處，卷1，圖版415。
Lot 8. An extremely rare 'Jun' foliate-rim vase, Northern Song-Jin dynasty (960-1234); 30.2 cm, 11 7/8 in. Estimate 500,000 — 700,000 GBP.
of archaic zun-form, the central globular bulb with a narrow ridge supported on a tall splayed foot, the elegant neck sweeping up the everted rim, the mouth festooned with five lobed, radiating petals, evenly covered overall in a lustrous lavender-blue glaze mottled with lilac and milk-white highlights, thinning to a mushroom color at the rim of the mouth, the glaze stopping short of the footring, revealing the ware burnt orange-brown in the firing.
Property from the Rui Xiu Lou Collection.
Provenance: Sotheby's New York, 4th June 1986, lot 45.Hirano Kotoken Co., Tokyo.Collection of T.T. Tsui (ref. SJ1).Sotheby's New York, 11th-12th September 2012, lot 131.
Exhibited: The Tsui Museum of Art, Hong Kong.
Literature: The Tsui Museum of Art, Hong Kong, 1991, pl. 39.
A Flamboyant Jun Vessel
Regina Krahl
This flamboyant shape, which combines concave, convex and conical outlines and terminates in a dramatic opening, is one of the most complex and memorable forms created by the Jun kilns prior to the Yuan dynasty (1279-1368). The almost geometric construction of this shape is untypical of a potter’s repertoire, yet not obviously following a metal prototype either. It would have represented a challenge for a craftsman working on the potters’ wheel, but clearly was highly admired at the time, since many different kilns of north China adopted it.
It is an ideal shape to emphasize the attraction of the thick, opaque Jun glaze, which works best on surfaces with clean lines, and its tendency to drain to a contrasting transparent olive tone is here effectively shown off at the rim. Jun ware examples of this finely executed, early type are extremely rare, but this striking form of the garlanded mouth, with its five downward-folded lappets and lobed ridges terminating in sharp points, continued to be employed by the Jun and other kilns well into the Yuan dynasty. Vases of this type then often had added handles, an attached stand and sometimes applied and splashed purple designs, such as the famous large Jun altar vase excavated from a Yuan site in Beijing, illustrated in Zhongguo taoci quanji [Complete series on Chinese ceramics], Shanghai, 1999-2000, vol. 10, pl. 205. The present vase might also have served as an altar vessel, although the down-curved lobes at its rim would also have made it a fine utilitarian vessel for pouring liquids.
Many types of flower-shaped rims of lobed, barbed and wavy outline that appear on Song ceramics can be traced to contemporary silver shapes, but the present form is not typical of silver or other metal wares and may rather have originated from forming the soft clay. It may represent an exaggerated form of the more undulating, less sharply defined lotus-leaf mouth popular with Song ceramics that imitates the wavy, curling edges characteristic of large lotus leaves. One metal example, a vase of beaten, gilded copper has, however, been published in a line drawing in Bo Gyllensvärd, ‘T’ang Gold and Silver’, Bulletin of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities, no. 29, Stockholm, 1957, fig. 38d. At present, it is difficult to determine where this type of rim might have derived from, but an intriguing illustration of a flower-filled bowl with a related garlanded rim is engraved on a horse-mounting stone at the mausoleum of the second Song Emperor, Renzong (r. 1023-1063), see Bei Song huang ling/The Imperial Tombs of the Northern Song Dynasty, Zhongzhou, 1997, p. 171, fig. 150: 1 (fig. 1).
Jun ware was made by many different kilns in Henan – e.g. Hebi, Anyang, Qixian, Jiaxian, Xin’an, Bacun, Yuxian and Linru – and even Hebei – Cizhou and Longhua (see Gugong Bowuyuan cang Zhongguo gudai yaozhi biaoben [Specimens from ancient Chinese kiln sites in the collection of the Palace Museum], vol. 1: Henan juan [Henan volume], Beijing, 2005, and vol. 2: Hebei juan [Hebei volume], Beijing, 2006). While many of these kilns, however, were following the Jun tradition only later, often not before the Yuan dynasty, Yuxian, where a large number of individual kilns were discovered, can be considered as the type site of Jun ware. It developed the archetypal Jun stonewares, which connoisseurs included among the Five Great Wares of the Song (960-1279). A fragment of a very similarly formed mouth of a vase, discovered at Liujiamen, one of the Yuxian Jun kilnsites, is illustrated op.cit., vol. 1, pl. 415 (fig. 2).
Preserved Jun vases of this distinctive, well proportioned form, are extremely rare and the only closely related example that appears to have been published is a piece from the collection of Simon Kwan, included in the Min Chiu Society Thirtieth Anniversary Exhibition, Selected Treasures of Chinese Art, Hong Kong Museum of Art, Hong Kong, 1990, cat. no. 101, and sold in these rooms, 12th November 2003, lot 50.
The form was popular at many other kilns nearby, mostly in Henan and Hebei provinces: a much smaller Ding vase of related form, in the Dingzhou City Museum of Hebei Province, and a sancai-glazed vase of very similar form and size in the Capital Museum, Beijing, are illustrated, for example, in Zhongguo taoci quanji, op.cit., vol. 9, pls 159 and 227. A monumental painted ‘Cizhou’ vase of this form in the Seattle Art Museum, another sancai example in the Idemitsu Museum of Arts, Tokyo, and a black-glazed vase of similar form with white ribs of slip across the body, are published in Mikami Tsugio, ed., Sekai tōji zenshū/Ceramic Art of the World, vol. 13: Ryō, Kin, Gen/Liao, Chin and Yüan Dynasties, Tokyo, 1981, col. pls 92, 276 and 283. The Seattle vase is illustrated again, together with several other black-and-white painted and green- or yellow-glazed Cizhou versions in Mino Yutaka, Freedom of Clay and Brush through Seven Centuries in Northern China. Tz'u-chou Type Wares, 960 - 1600 AD, Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indianapolis, 1980, pls 77, 78 and 96 and figs 206-9 and 279. An unglazed vase of this form, painted with a marble pattern in white slip, from the Eugene Bernat collection and included in the Loan Exhibition, Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 1947, no. 42, was sold in our New York rooms, 7th November 1980, lot 129.
At other kilns, such as Yaozhou in Shaanxi province or Jingdezhen in Jiangxi, vases with related mouth have a baluster-shaped body with more continuous outlines, see Songdai Yaozhou yaozhi/The Yaozhou Kiln Site of the Song Period, Beijing, 1998, p. 292, fig. 148: 3 and 4; p. 294, fig. 149, col. pl. 8, fig. 3, pl. 77, fig. 6, pl. 78, figs 1 and 2; and Hasebe Gakuji, ed., Sekai tōji zenshū/Ceramic Art of the World, volume 12: Sō/Sung Dynasty, Tokyo, 1977, col. pl. 32.
Important Chinese Art, London, 15 may 2019, 10:30 AM