AN ENAMEL ON WHITE GLASS SNUFF BOTTLE
Imperial, attributed to the Palace Workshops, Beijing, 1770-1799
Of flattened, rounded form with a cylindrical neck with a slightly flared mouth, and a neatly carved oval foot, decorated using famille rose enamels with on one main side a rooster standing a grassy bank under a spray of millet, beside a flowering cockscomb and rockwork, the reverse with a similar scene with a rooster pecking at the ground, the base with a three-character Guyuexuan mark; stopper.
2 1/2in (6.4cm) high
Footnotes:
1770-1799 白料粉彩「官上加官」鼻煙壺一件
御製 或為北京宮廷作坊製
《古月軒》款

Provenance:
Lilla Perry
Edmund F. Dwyer
Christie's London, October 12, 1987, lot 96
Joan and Ted Dorf Collection, no. 148

The Guyuexuan mark has long intrigued collectors of snuff bottles. Virtually nothing was known about the Guyuexuan for many years. This was because, apart from the marks on predominantly enamel on glass bottles, the Guyuexuan mark appears seldom elsewhere and, until recently, was not thought to appear in any archival documents. In addition to the lack of documentation, the range of enamel on glass bottles bearing these marks are confusing in both their stylistic differences and their quality. The diligent research of both Peter Y. K. Lam and Hugh Moss has changed that to a certain degree. The court was highly grandiose, entirely formal and was not conducive to every-day living. Thus, the Qing emperors preferred to live elsewhere and since the time of Kangxi, led to the building of summer palaces and in particular the Yuanmingyuan. The Yuanmingyuan was comprised of three parks; the Yuanmingyuan itself, the Changchunyuan and the Qichunyuan. It is the Changchunyuan which included a hall named the Guyuexuan. The Guyuexuan was fairly large in size being recorded as 'five columns wide'. It existed from 1767 until 1860 when the whole complex of the Yuanmingyuan was destroyed by the Allied Forces of the British and the French.

Typical soft pastel enamels often seen in this Guyuexuan group. There is an overall 'dry' quality to the surface of the enamels, again a finish sometimes encountered on this type. The three-character mark is only a ghostly remnant of what was originally an iron-red mark. Minute air bubble pin-prick to the base and slightly uneven edge to foot.