A rare and superb Longquan celadon phoenix-handled 'kinuta' vase, Southern Song dynasty | 南宋　龍泉青釉鳳耳紙槌瓶

Collection of Youichi Nakajima, former owner of Mitochu Tea Ceremony Shop, Nihonbashi, Tokyo, 1950-60s.

Linyushanren Collection.

Christie's New York, 15th September 2016, lot 717.

Mayuyama & Co., Ltd, Tokyo.

Cha no Kokoro Nihon Sadou Togeishi Ten [Mind of Tea Ceremony, History of Ceramic in Japanese Tea Ceremony], Suntory Museum, Itsuo Art Museum, 1982, cat. no. 28.

Nagomi [A Monthly Magazine by Tankosha], Tankosha, Tokyo, May 2018, p. 26.

Glowing in a vibrant sea-green tone, the present vase is a particularly fine and rare example of the celebrated Longquan kinuta wares. Named after its resemblance to a paper mallet (kinuta in Japanese), the present grand yet understated vase form is among the most iconic and desirable of any early Chinese ceramics. Despite its ‘mallet’ name, however, many scholars argue that this now-ubiquitous kinuta form – of broad neck and crisp phoenix handles – was likely first introduced to China in the forms of glass vases and bottles from the Islamic West and Iran. Though these fine wares initially may have arrived in China as foreign wares, their shape, simplicity and beauty soon found them embraced in the Chinese artistic canon. Compare an Islamic glass bottle vase, for example, probably from Nishapur, Iran, among the treasures excavated from the tomb of the Princess of Chen, Liao dynasty, dated no later than 1018 and illustrated in Grand View: Special Exhibition of Ju Ware from the Northern Sung Dynasty, Palace Museum, Taipei, 2007, cat. no. 25, fig. 2; and similar fragments of glass vessels of this shape found in 1997 among the excavated material from the cargo of the Intan shipwreck excavated off the Indonesian coast, believed to date to the Northern Song period. As the Song dynasty scholar Hong Mai once noted in his Yi Jian Zhi, even Emperor Huizong himself was said to own a collection of imported glass; see China at the Inception of the Second Millennium, Art and Culture of Sung Dynasty, 960-1279, Palace Museum, Taipei, 2000, p. 121, fig. 2. 

Kinuta vases of this size, fine potting and dazzling glaze quality are rare. Compare a vase in the Museum of Oriental Ceramics, Osaka, included in the exhibition Ice and Green Clouds. Traditions of Chinese Celadon, Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indianapolis, 1987, cat. no. 78; another in the Bishamon-do Temple, Kyoto, is illustrated in G. St. G. M. Gompertz, Chinese Celadon Wares, London, 1958, pl. 66; a third is in Longquan Celadon of China, Hangzhou, 1998, pl. 84; and a fourth with a galleried rim, preserved in the Taipei Palace Museum, published in Lung-ch'uan Ware of the Sung Dynasty, Hong Kong, 1962, pl. 6.

來源

中島洋一 （東京日本橋水戶忠茶道館主人） 收藏，1950至60年代

臨宇山人收藏

紐約佳士得2016年9月15日，編號717

繭山龍泉堂，東京

展覽

《茶の心 : 日本茶道陶藝史展》，逸翁美術館，熊本縣立美術館，三得利美術館，1982年，編號28

出版

《なごみ》，淡交社，東京，2018年5月，頁26

翠青瑩亮，此件紙槌瓶屬龍泉青瓷罕得佳作。以形似紙槌而得名（日本稱「砧」），青瓷紙槌瓶可謂早期中國藝術品最具代表性之一類，且廣得鑑藏家喜愛。有學者考據稱，此瓶形源自伊朗等西亞伊斯蘭國家。可比較一件內蒙遼陳國公主墓出土伊斯蘭琉璃瓶，或產自伊朗東北部內沙布爾，年代以1018年為下限，圖見《大觀‧北宋汝窰特展》，故宮博物院，台北，2007年，編號25，圖2。1997年印尼印坦古代沉船出土玻璃瓶殘片，形與本瓶相同，該船應為北宋商船。宋人洪邁《夷堅志》也有相關記載，指徽宗收藏一套番國製琉璃瓶。更多詳細討論，請參見《千禧年宋代文物大展》，故宮博物院，台北，2000年，頁121，圖2。

類同尺寸的紙槌瓶，釉色、作工能媲美本品者寥寥，比較大阪東洋陶瓷博物館收藏一例，錄於《Ice and Green Clouds. Traditions of Chinese Celadon》，印第安納波利斯藝術博物館，1987年，編號78；京都毘沙門堂藏一瓶，載于G. St. G. M. Gompertz，《Chinese Celadon Wares》，倫敦，1958年，圖版66；《中國龍泉青瓷》，杭州，1998年，圖版84；台北故宮博物院藏一例，出版於《故宮藏瓷‧龍泉窯》，香港，1962年，圖版6。