Chinese vase found in attic sells for $19m

Extremely rare

Chinese famille-rose (rose family) porcelain wares of the Qianlong period are extremely rare in the market, with most examples currently housed in the National Palace Museum in Taipei and other museums around the world.

When these pieces do come to auction, they sell for astronomical prices. In April, Sotheby's Hong Kong sold a famille-rose porcelain bowl for HK $239 million ($30.4 million).

Sotheby's said that these so-called yangcai porcelain commissions were the very epitome of the ware produced by the Jingdezhen imperial kilns. They were made as one-of-a-kind items, sometimes in pairs, but never in large quantities.

Henry Howard-Sneyd, Sotheby's chairman of Asian Art for Europe and the Americas, was optimistic about the future of such discoveries.

"Chinese art has been admired and collected across Europe for centuries, but the importance of certain pieces is occasionally lost over time," he said.

"Given the huge appetite for Chinese art among today's collectors, now is the moment to scour your homes and attics, and to come to us with anything you might find."