Famille Noire Dragon bat bowl.

heavenguy · May 21, 2016, 01:58:59

hello,

I found this Famille Noire bowl and I was wondering the age. I have seen so many examples online that I can't really distinguish between the mid century ones and late Qing ones. It has a Guanxu mark with an China Export mark. According to the Gotheborg mark guide this is 20th century but still a little vague on the age.

The only think I can distinguish from other examples is that on the flower petals they put a paint dot and then they drag the paint to create a line effect. Wasn't that common for a mid century ware? But I have seen many people put some famille noire ware examples with that effect and put them as 19th century. Did they continue to make that effect in early 20th century to mid-century?

not very big either around 3 inches tall.

Thank you in advance

heavenguy · May 21, 2016, 02:00:10

more pics

heavenguy · May 21, 2016, 02:00:48

Sorry. for some reason, I put this in the Japanese section. My bad.

Stan · May 21, 2016, 08:22:12

Hi Heavenguy, I think they stopped using the China mark in 1920 and from then on it was made in China until today, I think this might be early republic, but I am not sure that they used a six Qianlong mark, I think they were using a four character mark at that time, so it could be later, republic period, this is a brush pot.

peterp · May 21, 2016, 10:30:11

Relying on the nature of this millefiori decoration I would think that is about second quarter, perhaps 1940s or thereabout?
Stan, you can not rely on the mark alone, always consider several factors. It might have been added on a later item. The CHINA mark seems to have been added frequently with a rubber stamp. I would be interested to know if this specific millefiori pattern can be proven to have existed earlier.

heavenguy · May 21, 2016, 22:05:27

Hey guys,

Researching for information I ended up at the steps of another forum and I was reading that supposedly this millefiori pattern exists since the late 19th century and the person show two examples of a late 19th century vase and plate. Now this does not make it automatically right it just made me wonder more.

And on the stamp, yes they both look very rubber-ish. The "Da Qing Guangxu Nian Zhi" mark with China it's on the Gotheborg mark guide, and it says its Guangxi 20th century. But it also shows one that its 1939. So yeah. I guess this vase is 40's like Peter mentioned...

Today there is a bunch of estate sales I need to go, let's see how it goes...

Thank you all.

peterp · May 22, 2016, 13:27:56

I would recommend to verify such information with some museum or research based information. As for my information there was no black ground on Qing dynasty items. Millefiori (aka 'mille fleur') decorations started to be made in about the Qianlong reign, but there were never plenty until the end of the Qing dynasty. It became apparently more popular in the early 20th century. The Qing millefiori I have seen were more detailed and delicate than this is, and they had no black. Some have a very light greenish interior.

One of the Chinese names for this decoration is ?????, which can be translated as 'the hundred flowers don't show the ground'. From this name we can know that the original decoration was meant to show no ground at all. I found that the later an item the more ground it shows (or the lazier the painters got?). It is troublesome to paint so many flowers I assume.

Stan · May 22, 2016, 22:54:00

Hi Peter, and Heavenguy, I agree with Peter, 1940's age, when I say republic period, I mean from 1912 to 1949, the mark is stamped which I believe was done in the later part of the republic period.

heavenguy · May 24, 2016, 02:12:20

Thank you both,

I started looking at many examples of this pattern and this one looks so lazy and probably done very rapidly. I thank you both for the age verification and I think I learned a little more about the subject. Thank you so much for your answers and have a great day.