A GROUP OF SIX BLUE AND WHITE PORCELAIN BOYS, YONGZHENG PERIOD, FROM THE CA MAU SHIPWRECK

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A GROUP OF SIX BLUE AND WHITE PORCELAIN BOYS, YONGZHENG PERIOD, FROM THE CA MAU SHIPWRECK China, c. 1725. Each finely modeled, depicted seated with the legs slightly bent, dressed in a diaphanous garment covering the torso and tied at the waist, painted in cobalt blue beneath a transparent glaze, while holding various items, including lotus stems, a water flask, a fish, and a leafy fruit. Their plump, schematically rendered faces bear gentle smiles and are distinguished by two buns atop their rounded heads, likewise accented in underglaze blue. (6) Dimensions: Height 11.7–12.4 cm The Ca Mau shipwreck was a Chinese ocean-going junk, almost certainly bound from Canton (present-day Guangzhou) for the Dutch trading port of Batavia (present-day Jakarta). The vessel was lost off the Ca Mau Peninsula following a severe fire. Among the objects recovered were several wine cups bearing the reign mark of the Yongzheng Emperor (r. 1723-1735), providing important evidence for a date in the second quarter of the eighteenth century. Fishermen working off the Ca Mau Peninsula discovered the wreck after their nets became entangled with the site and, on recognizing the commercial value of the porcelain, began to recover material from it. The Vietnamese Ministry of Culture and Information subsequently intervened to secure the site and oversee the archaeological excavation. Approximately 130,000 objects were recovered, of which some 76,000 pieces in the finest condition were selected for sale at Sotheby’s Amsterdam on 29-31 January 2007 under the title Made in Imperial China: 76,000 Pieces of Chinese Export Porcelain from the Ca Mau Shipwreck, where the present lot was sold. Porcelain figures depicting children were popular products of the ceramic workshops of Jingdezhen during the early eighteenth century. They were based on forms familiar to Chinese potters, often incorporating elements derived from European models introduced by foreign merchants. The present figures probably represent the Hehe Erxian, the Daoist twin immortals associated with harmony and concord in Chinese popular religion. Identical figures were also recovered from the cargo of the Geldermalsen, a Dutch East India Company vessel that sank in Indonesian waters in 1752. Literature comparison: Compare a closely related underglaze-blue painted porcelain figure of a boy, dated c. 1725-1750, 12 cm high, in the Victoria & Albert Museum, accession number C.28A-1969.

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