In 1911 the last emperor of the Qing dynasty was deposed and the Republic of China was proclaimed, Tuva was taken by Russia and Mongolia and Tibet declared their independence. The founding father of the republic, Sun Yat-sen, became the first Republican president. In 1945, the civil war resumed and was won in 1949 by the communists led by Mao Zedong. The Kuomintang regime fled to Taiwan, where it endured. On October 1, 1949, the People’s Republic of China was proclaimed. Only when Mao died in 1976 did the Cultural Revolution end. After a power struggle and the imprisonment of the Gang of Four that followed Mao’s death, the economically pragmatic Deng Xiaoping became the undisputed leader, liberalizing the economy (market socialism). As a result, China began to work its way up to a great economic power. However, the absolute power of the Communist Party was maintained, if necessary with severe repression, as was shown by the crushing of the Tiananmen protest in June 1989.

Shown is a pair of Chinese porcelain sleeve vases. These have a long cylindrical corpus with straight walls and a round, almost flat base ring. At the top, the rim and lip bulges outwardly. Both vases are very similar, but not completely identical. They are printed over a milky white glaze with a blue and white decor. We see numerous valuables scattered over the corpus, including vases, two horns, incense burner, swastika, linchi, two fish, two rings, two books, the shell, …. At the top we see a frieze of overlapping ruyi elements. At the bottom there is a wide band of lapet panels. They are very light in weight. The bottom is also glazed, except for the foot ring. In the center we see an overglaze blue mark, consisting of four characters. Its meaning is unknown to me. The vase was probably made in the second half of the 20th century.

Condition: both are perfect.