A RARE BLUE AND WHITE BASIN

TIANQI SIX-CHARACTER MARK IN UNDERGLAZE BLUE WITHIN A DOUBLE CIRCLE AND OF THE PERIOD (1621-1627)

Details

A RARE BLUE AND WHITE BASIN
Tianqi six-character mark in underglaze blue within a double circle and of the period (1621-1627)
Stoutly potted with compressed, rounded sides rising to an everted rim painted with composite foliate scroll, the interior painted with a basket filled with a profusion of peonies and hydrangea, with fruiting branches and sprigs scattered below, the exterior with birds flying or perched on branches below double-line scrolls under the rim, the unglazed base with a recessed medallion for the nianhao
12¾in. (32.5cm.) diam.

Lot Essay

Very similarly decorated basins of this unusual shape, also bearing the Tianqi reign mark, are in the Nezu Art Museum, Tokyo, illustrated in Sekai toji zenshu, Tokyo, 1976, vol. 14, p. 114, no. 115 and in the Butler Collection illustrated by Sir Michael Butler, M. Medley and S. Little in Seventeenth-Century Chinese Porcelain from the Butler Family Collection, Alexandria, Virginia, 1990, p. 40, no. 5, where another, in the National Museum, Tokyo, is also mentioned. The decoration, a basket of auspicious flowers, was popular during the Wanli period and continued to be so all the way into the Kangxi period.

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