Tea Time
Jingdezhen, 1830–1890
Height: 6 cm
Mouth/lip: 0.68/1.12 cm
Stopper: glass
Provenance:
Robert Kleiner (1992)
The Mary and George Bloch Collection
Sotheby’s, Hong Kong, 24 November 2014, lot 101
Iron-red enamel on colourless glaze on cobalt on porcelain; with a convex lip, a horizontally ridged neck, flat foot and flattened foot rim; painted with a poem in iron-red regular script followed by Qianlong bingyin xiaochun yuti 乾隆丙寅小春御題 (‘Imperial composition by the Qianlong emperor in the “little spring” [tenth month] of the bingyin year’) followed by two seals, ren 仁 (‘benevolence’) and yin 印 (‘seal’), framed between base and shoulder borders of formalized lingzhi and pale blue lines; the foot, lip, inner neck, and interior glazed.
The poem reads
梅花色不妖，佛手香且潔。松實味芳腴，三品殊清絕。烹以折腳鐺，沃之承筐雪。火候辨魚蟹，鼎煙迭生滅。越甌潑仙乳，氈廬適禪悅。五蘊淨大半，可悟不可說。馥馥兜羅遞，活活雲漿澈。偓佺遺可餐，林逋賞時別。懶舉趙州案，頗笑玉川譎。寒宵聽行漏，古月看懸玦。軟飽趁幾餘，敲吟興無竭。
The colour of prunus is not wantonly bewitching;
The Buddha’s hand citron is fragrant and clean.
Pine nuts were never heavy with fragrance;
All three are unique for their purity.
I boil them in a tea-warmer with short curved legs;
Infusing them with snow gathered in a bamboo basket.
Tending the fire, I distinguish fish- and crab-eye bubbles;
The steam now rising, now dissipating from the pot.
Into a Yue ware bowl I pour milk of the immortals;
In a felt tent I feel the joys of meditation.
The Five Skandas are purified and all is at peace;
This experience can only be felt; it cannot be described.
Rich with fragrance, the white floss is passed around,
The bubbly nectar-like fluid becomes clear.
What the immortal Woquan left behind, we mortals can feed on.
What the poet Lin Bu once admired was from a different time.
Too lazy to lift the Zhaozhou case;
I cannot help laughing at Yuchuan’s artfulness.
In this chilly night I listen to the sound of the clepsydra;
At the ancient moon I gaze: a half-round pendant.
Feeling relaxed and full, I take advantage of this leisure moment,
To chant a few verses to my heart’s content.
