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Lot Essay
The deep rounded bowl is finely painted on the interior with a central peony blossom within a double-line, encircled by six chrysanthemum blooms on a continuous leafy scrolls. The exterior is decorated with six undulating peony sprays, while the slightly flared rim and the straight foot are decorated with key-fret borders.
Since its appearance in the Tang dynasty, the application of copper oxide as an underglaze red colourant in high-fired ceramics has presented an extraordinary technical challenge. Due to the extreme volatility of copper in the reducing atmosphere of the kiln, firing outcomes were notoriously unpredictable, often resulting in muted greyish-brown tones or complete failure. Despite the technical difficulties, underglaze-red porcelain was produced systematically on a considerable scale during the Hongwu reign due to emperor’s personal favour, yielding some of the finest underglaze-red decorated porcelains of the Ming dynasty. Characterised by restrained and well-organised designs, these copper-red vessels were clearly destined for use at court.
As vessel failure rates remained exceptionally high, successfully fired examples are exceedingly rare. Among this select group, the present bowl stands at the pinnacle of copper-red colouration, achieving an ideal, deep raspberry-red tone of unequaled saturation and stability, a testament of Ming imperial ceramic technology. While bowls of this specific form and design adhere to a standardised size, surviving examples exhibit considerable tonal variation depending on kiln conditions. Comparative Hongwu examples in major institutional collections illustrate this spectrum: a closely related bowl in the Palace Museum, Beijing, achieves a rich tone comparable to the present lot, though with a slightly softer saturation and a more spacious layout, illustrated in The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum, Blue and White Porcelain with Underglazed Red (I), Hong Kong, 2000, p. 241, no. 222 (fig. 1); whereas an example in the Palace Museum, Taipei, demonstrates the more typical firing result of a cooler, greyer shade of copper red, collection no.: guci013296N (fig. 2). Further variations in border motifs are also recorded, such as examples featuring a classic scroll band at the rim, see one formerly in the collection of Sakamoto Goro, sold at Sotheby’s Hong Kong, 8 October 2014, lot 3505. The technical difficulty of achieving consistent colouration across expansive surfaces is even more pronounced on larger Hongwu vessels, where the firing process frequently produced broad tonal shifts across the body, refer to such large copper-red reserve-decorated bowl, sold at Christie’s New York, 27 March 2026, lot 647 (fig. 3).
Since its appearance in the Tang dynasty, the application of copper oxide as an underglaze red colourant in high-fired ceramics has presented an extraordinary technical challenge. Due to the extreme volatility of copper in the reducing atmosphere of the kiln, firing outcomes were notoriously unpredictable, often resulting in muted greyish-brown tones or complete failure. Despite the technical difficulties, underglaze-red porcelain was produced systematically on a considerable scale during the Hongwu reign due to emperor’s personal favour, yielding some of the finest underglaze-red decorated porcelains of the Ming dynasty. Characterised by restrained and well-organised designs, these copper-red vessels were clearly destined for use at court.
As vessel failure rates remained exceptionally high, successfully fired examples are exceedingly rare. Among this select group, the present bowl stands at the pinnacle of copper-red colouration, achieving an ideal, deep raspberry-red tone of unequaled saturation and stability, a testament of Ming imperial ceramic technology. While bowls of this specific form and design adhere to a standardised size, surviving examples exhibit considerable tonal variation depending on kiln conditions. Comparative Hongwu examples in major institutional collections illustrate this spectrum: a closely related bowl in the Palace Museum, Beijing, achieves a rich tone comparable to the present lot, though with a slightly softer saturation and a more spacious layout, illustrated in The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum, Blue and White Porcelain with Underglazed Red (I), Hong Kong, 2000, p. 241, no. 222 (fig. 1); whereas an example in the Palace Museum, Taipei, demonstrates the more typical firing result of a cooler, greyer shade of copper red, collection no.: guci013296N (fig. 2). Further variations in border motifs are also recorded, such as examples featuring a classic scroll band at the rim, see one formerly in the collection of Sakamoto Goro, sold at Sotheby’s Hong Kong, 8 October 2014, lot 3505. The technical difficulty of achieving consistent colouration across expansive surfaces is even more pronounced on larger Hongwu vessels, where the firing process frequently produced broad tonal shifts across the body, refer to such large copper-red reserve-decorated bowl, sold at Christie’s New York, 27 March 2026, lot 647 (fig. 3).