Master Art

European Market


A fine Chinese porcelain teapot and cover decorated with the ‘tobacco leaf’ pattern in underglaze blue and famille rose enamels, with leaves and flowers, the spout and handle modelled as bamboo.

The origins of the tobacco leaf design remain unclear though it is thought to have been inspired by designs on Indian textiles. It was very popular in the second half of the eighteenth century and appears in a wide range of versions which included pheasants or treeshrews and in so-called ‘pseudo-tobacco leaf’, with different colours, as well as a later nineteenth century versions in very thick bright enamels.

References: Debomy 2013, p289, another teapot like this, which the author classifies as pattern A1.