Vase with Golden Pheasants (1736–95): Art, History and Details

Vase with Golden Pheasants (1736–95) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

The flower-and-bird painting in this vase was intricately executed in colored enamels (falangcai), with careful modeling, shading, and blending of colors reflecting European influences through missionary-artists at the Qing court. The Jesuit artist Giuseppe Castiglione (1688–1766), in particular, exerted tremendous impact at the Qianlong academy.

Object facts

• Title: Vase with Golden Pheasants
• Date: 1736–95
• Culture: China, Jiangxi province, Jingdezhen kilns, Qing dynasty (1644-1911), Qianlong mark and period (1736-95)
• Type: Ceramic
• Technique: porcelain painted in polychrome enamels over transparent glaze
• Dimensions: Overall: 18.6 x 10.5 cm (7 5/16 x 4 1/8 in.)
• Collection: China - Qing Dynasty
• Department: Chinese Art
• Accession number: 1971.145

A detail from the museum

Refined porcelains produced in Jingdezhen kilns were sent to Beijing palace workshops to be decorated in falangcai technique under direct imperial supervision.

Collection credit

John L. Severance Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Hobson, R. L., Bernard Rackham, and William King. Chinese Ceramics in Private Collections. London: Halton & T. Smith, Ltd, 1931.
• Hobson, R. L., Bernard Rackham, and William King. Chinese Ceramics in Private Collections. London: Halton & T. Smith, Ltd, 1931.
• The Barbara Hutton Collection of Chinese Porcelain; [Exhibition] Honolulu Academy of Arts, November 1956-January 1957. Honolulu: [Honolulu Academy of Arts], 1957.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.