An Eighteenth Century Chinese bowl fetched $19.67 million at Christie’s on November 28, setting a new world record price for Qing porcelain. Among the items offered in Christie’s Jade Shears and Shimmering Feathers — Imperial Chinese Ceramics from the Robert Chang Collection, the imperial famille rose bowl from the Qianlong period (1736–1795) was sold to Dr Alice Cheng, a Hong Kong collector.

The finely potted bowl is enameled to the exterior in two shades of pink, yellow, green brown and black with graceful swallows in flight beside a flowering apricot tree. It is the only existing example in private hands; its pair is in the Percival David Foundation in London.

The bowl also set a record as the most expensive work of art ever sold in any Asian auction, according to Christie’s. A complete review of this sale will appear in a future issue.