A FINE PAIR OF BLUE AND WHITE PRONK 'ARBOR' PLATES Qianlong period, circa 1740 Decorated with chinoiserie figures under an arbor surrounded by three children, with ducks in a pond in the foreground, the rim with panels of fruit, flowers and insects interspersed with palmettes, all in underglaze blue with gilt detailing. 9in (23cm) diam (2). Footnotes: 乾隆時期 約1740年 青花普龍克《涼亭》盤一對 Published Cohen & Cohen, Baroque & Roll, Antwerp, 2015, pp. 112-113, no. 70 出版： 倫敦Cohen & Cohen古董行，《Baroque & Roll》，安特衛普，2015年，頁112-113，圖版編號70 Although the original pattern has not been found the design is certain to have come from the Dutch drawing master Cornelis Pronk, who was commissioned by the Dutch East India Company in 1734 to create designs specifically to be reproduced on porcelain. This is probably his fourth design for the VOC, produced in 1737 and known in blue and white, and in opaque enamels but not in Chinese Imari. Yasumasa Oka (1985) identified a drawing by Pronk of a cholon, or Chinese teahouse, in the gardens of Bosch en Hoven, near Haarlem, which is in the same shape as the topiary here. Such teahouses were popular in many Dutch gardens. The cholon was also engraved by Hendrik de Leth but was replaced in the 1920s by a small chapel. The four insects on the rim were taken from Maria Sybilla Merian's Erucarum Ortus, published in 1718 and in an enlarged Dutch edition, European Insects, in 1730. Three of these have been identified before (Cohen & Cohen 2012, 66-7). The flowers and the other eight panels are European style but have not been identified. For an informative discussion of the use of documented patterns by Pronk, see William R. Sargent, Treasures of Chinese Export Ceramics from the Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, 2012, pp. 275-293, nos. 146 and 147. See also, Scheurleer, 1974, plate 202; Jörg, 1980, nos. 48-50, 34; Jörg, 1989 no. 52; Du Boulay, 1966, 262; Le Corbeiller, 1973, cat. 30, and 1974, fig. 24; Forbes, 1982, 42, no. 69; Litzenburg, 2002, 177; Howard, 1994, nos. 55-4; Clunas, 1987, pl. 48; Shimizu & Chabanne, 2003, no. 158, 207; Oka, Antike, no. 2, Aug/Sept 1985, 69-76; Mezin, 2002, no. 28, 53.