Straits Chinese Porcelain Bowl

Straits Chinese Polychrome Bowl

This pink and white bowl, of a good diameter, is enamelled with a phoenix and pink and green peonies, framed by a pink-ground border of lotus and Buddhistic emblems and a smooth, gilded rim.

It has a shop mark to the base: it is almost indistinct, but probably is the Zhushunchang Zao factory mark.

This bowl most probably belonged to a set of porcelain commissioned from China by a wealthy Malacca or Singapore

baba family for an elaborate Straits Chinese wedding. It is not a soup bowl; the Straits Chinese rarely had soup with their meals, and it is too large to have served as a tea cup. It might have served a s a small serving bowl or as a dessert bowl.

Overall condition is excellent – there are no cracks, chips or restorations.

Kee, M.Y., Peranakan Porcelain: Vibrant Festive Ware of the Straits Chinese, Tuttle Publishing, 2009; Ho, W.M., Straits Chinese Porcelain: A Collector’s Guide, Times Books International, 1983.

UK art market.