A PAIR OF UNUSUAL SMALL FINELY PAINTED BLUE AND WHITE DISHES

KANGXI PERIOD (1662-1722)

Details

A PAIR OF UNUSUAL SMALL FINELY PAINTED BLUE AND WHITE DISHES
KANGXI PERIOD (1662-1722)
Each with shallow rounded sides rising to an everted rim and finely decorated in a very painterly style on the interior with a pair of cranes in a highly stylized landscape setting incorporating a gnarled peach tree and overly large peaches strewn on the ground, in both the tree is bare, but in one a young tree bearing fruit and leaves rises from the foreground, with three blossoming branches on the exterior and a fu symbol within a double circle on the base
6¼ in. (16 cm.) diam. (2)

Provenance

Sir Harry and Lady Garner Collection, no. 45.
Bluett, London.
H. Wingfield Digby Collection.

Literature

Sir Harry Garner, Oriental Blue & White, London, 1954, pl. 75, p. 47.
D. Macintosh, Chinese Blue & White Porcelain, London, 1977, p. 74, fig. 54.

Exhibited

London, Oriental Ceramic Society, Chinese Blue and White Porcelain, 14th to 19th Centuries, 16 December 1953 - 23 January 1954, nos. 246 and 247.
London, The Victoria and Albert Museum, Oriental Ceramic Society, The Ceramic Art of China, 9 June - 25 July 1971, pl. 132, no. 194.

Lot Essay

No other blue and white dishes of this unusual design appear to have been published.

In his discussion of this pair of dishes in Oriental Blue and White, op. cit., p. 47, Sir Harry Garner writes, "The pair of saucer dishes, with their sensitive drawing of cranes and peach trees, surely refutes the argument, often put forward, that the drawing on K'ang Hsi blue and white is always mechanical."

Both the crane and the peach are symbols of longevity, and it is interesting to note the disproportionately large size of the latter in the design. The fu character, which appears on the back of both dishes, is one of the Twelve Insignia associated mainly with imperial court robes, and represents the power to judge.

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