Bowl with openwork dragons chasing flaming pearl

The outside walls of this small, shallow gray bowl are carved with high-relief waves from which three dragons emerge to peer over the rim and chase a flaming pearl. The thickness of the vessel walls, the dragon motif, and the depth of the carving recall Yuan and Ming basins and bowls. The eighteenth-century carver may have been inspired by a massive Yuan basin that the Qianlong emperor installed in the Round Fort, Beijing (Hansford, plate 78).