A RARE DATED CARVED RED LACQUER 'DRAGON AND PHOENIX' DISH

Details
A RARE DATED CARVED RED LACQUER 'DRAGON AND PHOENIX' DISH
INCISED AND GILT WANLI EIGHT-CHARACTER MARK, DA MING WANLI YIWEI NIAN ZHI, CORREPONDING TO A.D.1595 AND OF THE PERIOD

Carved to the central medallion with a scaly four-clawed dragon and a descending phoenix contesting a flaming pearl above crashing waves and rockwork, amid flowering branches and reserved on a ground of crested waves and lozenge pattern enclosing flower-heads, the well carved with four panels each enclosing a floral scroll, alternating with Buddhist Emblems, the exterior with a dense flowering meander, above a key-fret border, the mark incised on the black lacquer base in a horizontal line (age cracks)
10 1/8 in. (28.5 cm.) diam., box

Lot Essay

Cf. two examples, one a polychrome lacquer circular box and the other a red lacquer square box, both with the same yiwei (1595) cyclical date were exhibited by The Oriental Ceramic Society of Hong Kong and The Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2000 Years of Chinese Lacquer, and illustrated, Catalogue, nos. 68 and 69. It has been suggested that during this period different types of lacquer, carved red, yellow, polychrome and tianqi were abundantly produced in the official Wanli workshops, ibid., p. 134.

For a smaller dish of the same design bearing a slightly earlier cyclical date, 1592, formerly in the collection of Sir Harry Garner, see by Riddell, Dated Chinese Antiquities, pl. 166, p. 210. Cf. also a carved dish with a five-clawed dragon pursuing a flaming pearl amid waves from the Art Institute, Chicago, op. cit., pl. 168, p. 211.

(US$13,000-20,000)

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