拍品专文
Previously sold in Hong Kong, 2 November 1994, lot 26.
Very few thinly potted fifteenth-century white wares with anhua decoration have survived and it is particularly rare to find a dragon dish with a Yongle reign mark, the majority surviving marked pieces being stemcups, of which sherds have been found at Jingdezhen. Cf. the excavated examples included in the Chang Foundation exhibition, Imperial Hongwu and Yongle Porcelain Excavated at Jingdezhen, 1996, Catalogue, nos. 158-160. It is also very unusual to find anhua dishes decorated with five dragons, although two closely related dishes of larger size (19.9 cm.) are in the National Palace Museum, Taiwan, both with archaistic Yongle four-character marks in the centre, one of which is included in the Illustrated Catalogue of Ming Dynasty Porcelain, pl. 27.
Other Yongle pieces with anhua decoration are published. An eggshell dragon bowl in the British Museum with an archaistic Yongle four-character mark incised in the centre is illustrated and discussed by R. Krahl in 'A New Look at the Development of Chinese Ceramics', Orientations, November 1992, p. 70, fig. 6.
A stemcup of the new pure and translucent tianbai ('sweet white') porcelain which the Emperor Yongle so admired was included in the Exhibition of Imperial Porcelain of the Yongle and Xuande Periods Excavated from the Site of the Ming Imperial Factory at Jingdezhen, Hong Kong, 1989, Catalogue no. 1, centred by an impressed four-character Yongle mark encircled by lotus petals. Liu Xinyuan discusses these four-character marks in seal script in the Catalogue, pp. 74-75, stating that the calligraphy is based on that of Shen Du, a court calligrapher much esteemed by the Emperor and his calligraphy was often chosen to inscribe objects made in precious materials; for a carved inscription by Shen Du dated 1415, see op. cit., fig. 13.
(US$77,000-100,000)
Very few thinly potted fifteenth-century white wares with anhua decoration have survived and it is particularly rare to find a dragon dish with a Yongle reign mark, the majority surviving marked pieces being stemcups, of which sherds have been found at Jingdezhen. Cf. the excavated examples included in the Chang Foundation exhibition, Imperial Hongwu and Yongle Porcelain Excavated at Jingdezhen, 1996, Catalogue, nos. 158-160. It is also very unusual to find anhua dishes decorated with five dragons, although two closely related dishes of larger size (19.9 cm.) are in the National Palace Museum, Taiwan, both with archaistic Yongle four-character marks in the centre, one of which is included in the Illustrated Catalogue of Ming Dynasty Porcelain, pl. 27.
Other Yongle pieces with anhua decoration are published. An eggshell dragon bowl in the British Museum with an archaistic Yongle four-character mark incised in the centre is illustrated and discussed by R. Krahl in 'A New Look at the Development of Chinese Ceramics', Orientations, November 1992, p. 70, fig. 6.
A stemcup of the new pure and translucent tianbai ('sweet white') porcelain which the Emperor Yongle so admired was included in the Exhibition of Imperial Porcelain of the Yongle and Xuande Periods Excavated from the Site of the Ming Imperial Factory at Jingdezhen, Hong Kong, 1989, Catalogue no. 1, centred by an impressed four-character Yongle mark encircled by lotus petals. Liu Xinyuan discusses these four-character marks in seal script in the Catalogue, pp. 74-75, stating that the calligraphy is based on that of Shen Du, a court calligrapher much esteemed by the Emperor and his calligraphy was often chosen to inscribe objects made in precious materials; for a carved inscription by Shen Du dated 1415, see op. cit., fig. 13.
(US$77,000-100,000)