A LARGE BLUE AND WHITE 'HARBOUR SCENE' MOULDED BALUSTER VASE Kangxi Robustly potted of elegant baluster shape surmounted by a tall cylindrical neck, the body vibrantly painted in cobalt-blue with a harbour containing walled houses with upturned roofs and pavilions, on the waterfront various boats and sampans as well as a European galleon detailed with cross-hatched sails and rigging, all between bands of lappets containing floral sprays and smaller landscape scenes, the neck with two further bands of landscape scenes. 49cm (19 1/4in) high. Footnotes: Please note this Lot is to be sold at No Reserve. 本拍品不設底價 清康熙 青花風景人物圖觀音樽 Published and Illustrated: M.White, Living at the Whites' House: Ceramics from the Mary and Peter White collection, vol.4, n.p, 2023, p.309 著錄：M.White，《Living at the Whites' House: Ceramics from the Mary and Peter White collection》，第4冊，無出版地，2023年，第309頁 The present vase is decorated with a Chinese harbour scene but is unusual in incorporating a European-style vessel, a motif that reflects the broader context of maritime trade during the Kangxi period. Following decades of internal consolidation, the Qing state reopened coastal trade in the late 17th century, allowing European merchants, including the Dutch East India Company (VOC), the English East India Companies, and Portuguese traders, limited access to Chinese ports such as Canton (Guangzhou). These merchants sought luxury goods, especially Chinese porcelain, silk, and tea, which were in high demand in Europe, while silver bullion flowed into China in exchange. Scenes of Europeans and their ships thus appear occasionally on blanc-de-Chine and blue and white wares. It is particularly interesting to note that the sails of the European vessel have been shaded with cross-hatching, a technique commonly employed in European etchings or engravings. This suggests that Chinese craftsmen were likely copying a European source, but perhaps did not fully understand the shading convention, as the technique appears only on the vessel and nowhere else on the composition. The inclusion of a European vessel within the harbour scene on this vase not only demonstrates the cosmopolitan visual vocabulary of Kangxi-period painters, but also serves as a subtle testament to the interwoven commercial and cultural exchanges between China and Europe in the early Qing era. See a related blue and white gu vase, Kangxi, decorated with a European vessel and foreigners, illustrated by B.MacGuire, Four Centuries of Blue and White: The Frelinghuysen Collection of Chinese and Japanese Export Porcelain, London, 2023, p.248. For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com For further information about this lot please visit the lot listing