Blue and White Garlic-Head Bottle Vase with Figures in a Landscape, Early Ming Dynasty

PP-0158

Description

A blue and white porcelain bottle vase with a rounded, garlic-head mouth, a tall neck and a broad body that narrows to a flared foot. The mouth is painted with a bird with outspread wings among clouds, and the neck with further clouds. A scroll of lotus flowers and leaves circles the shoulder. The body carries a continuous landscape: a fisherman in a small boat casts his line among reeds, a figure with flowing hair stands on the bank below, and other figures walk beside a fence, near a gnarled tree in full leaf. A ring of petal panels, each enclosing a cloud motif, decorates the foot.

The blue is deep, with darker touches where it gathered, under a glaze with an overall crackle. The flat base is unglazed and fired a warm orange. We attribute the vase to the early Ming dynasty.