Provenance: Switzerland, private collection

By the sixteenth century East Asian porcelain, especially the blue-and-white vessels produced in Jingdezhen for the European art market, was highly prized, and usually found its way into both princely and patrician Kunst- and Wunderkammer. The present flagon was, therefore, made as export ware in a European form and decorated with exotic underglaze painting in cobalt blue to meet the expectations of Western connoisseurs. To underscore the high value of the flagon, it was fitted with a lid and a thumb-piece of fire-gilt silver attached to the handle. The attraction of this flagon rests in the cobalt blue painting on a white ground, which signals at first glance that this is a treasure of East Asian origin. On its globular wall East Asian figures are depicted in a rocky landscaped garden, in which exotic vegetation suggests remote lands to the European viewer. What looks like a hole in the wall of the flagon resulting from a blow is actually damage incurred in firing: an impurity in the porcelain paste caused a bubble to form during the biscuit firing that burst as the vessel cooled. Despite this flaw incurred in the firing process, the flagon was viewed as precious, hence fitted with an ornate fire-gilt silver mount that is notable both for the cast and chased motifs on the handle and the thumb-piece as well as elegant engraving on the lid. Comparable Chinese blue-and-white porcelain Transitional period flagons are held, for instance, at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London and the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam. Vessels of this type with silver mounts are, however, rarer. Worth mentioning in this connection is a blue-and-white narrow-necked jug with a fire-gilt silver lid that came from the Kunstkammer of the margraves and grand dukes of Baden-Baden and is now held at the Badisches Landesmuseum in Karlsruhe.