65 | Fine porcelain bottle vase with sepia decoration Yongzheng period, 1723 – 1735 Height: 43 cm | 16 7/8 in Click image for full-size version With its bulbous body and tall slender neck, the vase is supported on a circular, slightly splayed foot – the decoration painted in sepia ink on a white glazed porcelain ground. A landscape scene unfolds around the body of the vase and the base of its neck – with pavilions and huts amongst mountains, a stream, trees, and distant views of cliffs and peaks. This Chinese taste illustration is quite densely painted in one section – evolving horizontally and contrastingly, in minimalist brush strokes, to depict the shores of a lake, with three small boats and distant hills. The painting is executed with great finesse. Similar examples: Kangxi, Yongzheng, Qianlong: Qing Porcelain from the Palace Museum Collection, Forbidden City Publishing, 1989 – plate 68 (within the Yongzheng section) illustrates a brushpot painted with a fine sepia landscape design. A smaller version of our Yongzheng vase – with similar decoration – is in the collection of the Musée Guimet, Paris.