The present dish belonged to a set of five dishes, one of which is now in the Tokyo National Museum, included in the exhibition, Oriental Lacquer Arts, Tokyo, 1977, and illustrated in the Catalogue, no. 424.
Two red lacquer dishes of this size and pattern are known, the first is in the Asian Art Museum, San Francisco, illustrated by C. Shangraw, 'Chinese Lacquers in the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco', Orientations, April 1986, p. 26. It has been mentioned that the surface of these dishes with its fine hairlike crackle, known as 'cow-hair cracks', was due to the thinness of the lacquer; and differs to Yuan period lacquers which have deep linear crackles, owing to their different construction and thicker applications of lacquer, ibid. The second floral-form dish is in the Tokyo National Museum, illustrated in Oriental Lacquer Arts, 1977, no. 424.
Compared to the Asian Art Museum example, and also the smaller mallow-form black lacquer dish from the same collection offered in the present sale as lot 2103, the present dish is unique in that the indentation of each petal along the rims has a more pronounced curve which considerably emphasises its floral shape.