For collectors, the chance to acquire a work with genuine museum provenance comes close to the ideal – a piece that has spent decades in institutional care, studied and documented, and rarely, if ever, seen on the open market.
When the Art Institute of Chicago consigned a large group of Chinese works of art through Christie's in 2019, the market responded with enthusiasm: all 84 lots in the dedicated live sale found buyers, with the total comfortably exceeding pre-sale estimates.
Seven years later, Christie’s New York is returning with another selection from the same institution. Scheduled for 17-18 September, the sale includes a strong group of imperial Qing porcelains from early patrons of the museum, among them an exceptionally rare Qianlong famille rose vase and a Yongzheng-period famille rose “bats and peaches” bowl. Proceeds from the auction will support acquisitions and the care of the institute’s Asian art collection.
The Art Institute of Chicago
In October 1871, the Great Chicago Fire reduced much of the city to rubble, destroying more than 17,000 buildings and leaving nearly a third of its residents homeless. Yet the disaster proved an unlikely catalyst. As Chicago rebuilt at extraordinary speed, a new generation of civic leaders, industrialists, and collectors set about transforming it into a cultural capital to rival New York, Paris and London.
Founded in 1879, the Art Institute served from the outset as both a museum and a school of fine arts. Its defining moment came in 1893, when a new Beaux‑Arts building on Michigan Avenue opened to coincide with the World’s Columbian Exposition – the celebrated Chicago World’s Fair – which drew more than 27 million visitors and introduced many Americans to the arts of Asia on an unprecedented scale.
In the decades that followed, prominent Chicagoans began directing their patronage toward Asian art, laying the foundation for a collection now regarded among the finest in the world, noted especially for its Chinese jades, bronzes, and porcelains.
Lot 1039 | A very rare famille rose and underglaze blue-decorated 'chilong and floral scroll' vase
Qianlong seal mark in underglaze blue and of the period (1736-1795)
Height: 33.6 cm
Provenance:
- Ralph M. Chait Galleries, New York (according to label)
- Henry C. Schwab (1867-1941) Collection, Chicago
- The Art Institute of Chicago, accessioned in 1941
Estimate: US$400,000 - 600,000
One of the institution's important early patrons was Henry C. Schwab. A Chicago-born businessman, philanthropist, and director of the World's Columbian Exposition, he was drawn particularly to the refined porcelains of the Kangxi and Qianlong reigns, acquiring extensively from the New York dealer Ralph M. Chait, while maintaining close ties with the museum's own curators.
Having passed from Chait into Schwab’s collection, the Qianlong famille rose vase entered the Art Institute following Schwab’s death in 1941. It formed part of a bequest of some 300 Chinese ceramics, highlights of which were prominently displayed near the museum’s entrance.
The vase embodies the Qianlong emperor’s taste for technical brilliance, opulent colour, and elaborate decoration with richly layered symbolism.
Its most distinctive feature is the pair of chi-dragon handles on the neck. Such archaistic handles often appear on imperial porcelains of the Qianlong period, though more commonly with a single dragon on each side. Here, each side is modelled with two dragons, one ascending and one descending, coiling toward an iron-red lingzhi fungus, an ancient emblem of immortality.
Auspicious symbols are woven throughout the decoration of the neck. A ruyi band below the mouth rim suggests the fulfilment of wishes, while inverted red bats signal the “arrival of blessings” through a familiar Chinese pun.
Beneath them appears a green double lotus seedpod with a pink lotus blossom below. The lotus is associated with Buddhism, purity and harmony, while the double lotus was especially prized. Its twin blooms, occurring entirely naturally and impossible to cultivate or induce, were seen as signs of virtuous rulership and successful future endeavours.
On the body, pairs of peaches extend the theme of longevity. Associated with Xiwangmu, the Queen Mother of the West, whose fabled peaches were said to confer immortality, the peach is among the most familiar symbols of long life in Chinese art. Here they number eight in total – an auspicious number in Chinese tradition and a grouping that also evokes the Eight Daoist Immortals.
The decoration combines underglaze cobalt blue with overglaze famille rose enamels, a technically exacting process that required careful planning from the outset. Once fired, the underglaze blue elements could not be changed; the enamel decoration therefore had to be composed around them with remarkable accuracy and control.
The form was popular in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, but is more commonly found with underglaze blue decoration alone and without handles. The present vase was originally one of a pair, and would have been especially appropriate as a gift for an imperial birthday.
Lot 1034 | A magnificent and very rare famille rose 'bats and peaches' bowl
Yongzheng six-character mark in underglaze blue within a double circle and of the period (1723-1735)
Diameter: 14.3 cm
Provenance:
- C. T. Loo (1880-1957), Paris
- Russell Tyson (1867-1963) Collection, Chicago
- The Art Institute of Chicago, accessioned in 1939
Estimate: US$400,000 - 600,000
Fully ripened peaches hang heavily from a flowering branch, their plump forms achieved through blown enamels and delicate brushwork, creating subtle modulations from pale green to rose-pink. The blossoms are treated with equal sensitivity: lightly poised on slender stems, they seem almost to tremble in an implied breeze, while red bats animate the composition in lively flight.
Like the preceding vase, this Yongzheng famille rose “bats and peaches” bowl may also have been made for an imperial birthday. Beginning low on the exterior, the branch rises up the curved wall and passes over the rim into the interior, where further peaches are depicted. This playful, continuous device, known as guozhihua, or “flowering branch passing over the rim,” is linked in Qing texts to a “branch passing over the wall” – a phrase that sounds like “lasting order” and conveys a wish for peace and good government.
This decorative device was especially admired on Qing imperial porcelains. Usually employed on dishes, where the painter had a broader and more accessible surface, it was considerably more difficult to execute on a small bowl, with its restricted, curved sides and confined interior.
Although the peach had long symbolised longevity in Chinese culture, it did not become a prominent motif in imperial ceramics until the Yongzheng and Qianlong reigns. Today, peach-decorated imperial porcelains from these two reigns rank among the most prized works of Qing ceramics, with leading examples now in museum collections or commanding remarkable prices at auction.
Peach-decorated famille rose porcelains were produced throughout much of the Qing dynasty, down to the Guangxu reign. Of all these, the Palace Museum in Beijing regards the Yongzheng examples as the finest, distinguished by their bright colours, varied palette, and exceptional painting.
One of the most celebrated examples in a public collection is the Yongzheng famille rose olive-shaped bat-and-peach vase in the Shanghai Museum. On the market, a pair of Yongzheng famille rose guoqiangzhi bowls formerly in the collection of the dealer and collector T. T. Tsui sold at auction in Hong Kong in 2015 for HK$89.8 million (US$11.5 million), while a closely related bowl from the Ai Lian Tang Collection achieved HK$32.2 million (US$4.1 million) at Christie's Hong Kong in April 2026.
The bowl also carries a distinguished provenance. It can first be traced to C. T. Loo, the legendary dealer whose Paris and New York galleries helped shape some of the greatest Western collections of Chinese art, before passing to the Chicago collector Russell Tyson.
Tyson’s interest in Chinese art began in childhood. Born in Shanghai and raised among Chinese furniture and objects, he remained drawn to the field throughout his life. After settling in Chicago, he became one of the Art Institute of Chicago’s most important patrons of Asian art. In 1922, he co-founded The Orientals, a scholarly patron group, and later served as the museum’s trustee, honorary vice president, and advisor to its Department of Asian Art.
Although Tyson collected widely, from Korean ceramics to Indian painting, Chinese ceramics remained his greatest passion. The Russell Tyson Gallery, dedicated in 1958, still houses the museum’s permanent display of Tang dynasty art.
Russell Tyson
Lot 1045 | A rare pair of iron-red-decorated yellow-ground 'dragon' bowls
Qianlong seal marks in underglaze blue and of the period (1736-1795)
Diameter: 11.9 cm
Provenance:
- Russell Tyson (1867-1963) Collection, Chicago
- The Art Institute of Chicago, accessioned in 1964
Estimate: US$150,000 - 250,000
Also from Russell Tyson’s collection, this pair of Qianlong yellow-ground iron-red dragon bowls entered the Art Institute in 1964.
By the Qianlong reign, the imperial kilns had mastered a wide range of enamel colours and decorative techniques. Even so, bowls painted in iron red on a yellow ground were relatively rare. In Chinese, this colour combination is known as huangshanghong, “red on yellow,” a name that sounds close to an auspicious phrase wishing the emperor boundless fortune.
Each bowl is covered in a bright yellow glaze and painted with five iron-red dragons moving across the surface, their scales, whiskers, and postures clearly articulated, above a band of waves near the foot. Bowls of this design first appeared in the Yongzheng reign and continued into the Qianlong period. Related examples are held in the Palace Museum in Beijing, the Nanjing Museum, and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London.
Other Highlight Lots:
Lot 1038 | A rare coral-ground falangcai 'floral' bowl
Yongzheng four-character yuzhi mark in underglaze blue within a double square and of the period (1723-1735)
Diameter: 11.7 cm
Provenance:
- Ralph M. Chait Galleries, New York (according to label)
- Henry C. Schwab (1867-1941) Collection, Chicago
- The Art Institute of Chicago, accessioned in 1941
Estimate: US$150,000 - 250,000
Lot 1041 | A rare small turquoise-ground famille rose 'lotus' vase
Qianlong seal mark in gilt and of the period (1736-1795)
Height: 15.5 cm
Provenance:
- Henry C. Schwab (1867-1941) Collection, Chicago
- The Art Institute of Chicago, accessioned in 1941
Estimate: US$150,000 - 250,000
Lot 1013 | An exceptionally rare famille rose 'quail' bowl
The porcelain: Hongzhi six-character mark in underglaze blue within a double circle and of the period (1488-1505), the enamels later added
Diameter: 20 cm
Provenance:
- The Art Institute of Chicago, accessioned prior to 1988
Estimate: US$120,000 - 180,000
Lot 1020 | A peachbloom-glazed 'three-string' vase, laifu zun
Kangxi six-character mark in underglaze blue and of the period (1662-1722)
Height: 19.5 cm
Provenance:
- Kate Sturges Buckingham (1858-1937) Collection, Chicago, before 1926
- The Art Institute of Chicago, accessioned as the Collection of Lucy Maud Buckingham (1870-1920) in 1926
Estimate: US$100,000 - 150,000
Lot 1037 | A rare small lemon-yellow-enameled cup
Yongzheng six-character mark in underglaze blue within a double circle and of the period (1723-1735)
Diameter: 19.8 cm
Provenance:
- Henry C. Schwab (1867-1941) Collection, Chicago
- The Art Institute of Chicago, accessioned in 1941
Estimate: US$80,000 - 120,000
Lot 1040 | A very rare reticulated famille rose 'five poisons' dish
Qianlong seal mark in underglaze blue and of the period (1736-1795)
Diameter: 20.5 cm
Provenance:
- Alfred E. Hippisley (1848-1939) Collection, New York
- Ralph M. Chait Galleries, New York (according to label)
- Henry C. Schwab (1867-1941) Collection, Chicago
- The Art Institute of Chicago, accessioned in 1941
Estimate: US$80,000 - 120,000
Lot 1042 | A very rare famille rose 'butterfly medallion' bowl
Qianlong seal mark in underglaze blue and of the period (1736-1795)
Diameter: 10.8 cm
Provenance:
- Henry C. Schwab (1867-1941) Collection, Chicago
- The Art Institute of Chicago, accessioned in 1941
Estimate: US$80,000 - 120,000
Auction Details:
Auction House: Christie’s New York
Sale: Important Chinese Art Including Ceramics from the Art Institute of Chicago
Auction Date: 17 - 18 September 2026
Preview Date: 11 - 16 September 2026
Venue: 20 Rockefeller Center