A rare underglaze-blue yellow-ground 'gardenia' saucer-dish


Hongzhi six-character mark and of the periodWith shallow rounded sides, painted in shaded tones of blue reserved on a rich yellow enamelled ground, the interior with a central medallion depicting a single leafy branch bearing two five-petalled gardenia blooms and a bud emerging from the top, encircled in the cavetto by fruiting branches of pomegranate, grape, peach and a ribboned lotus bouquet, all between double-line borders, the underside with a continuous scroll of blooming peonies between double lines at the rim and foot. 26.7cm (10 1/2in) diam.
|明弘治 黃地青花梔子花盤青花「大明弘治年製」楷書款Hongzhi dishes of this design can be found in several important museum and private collections around the world. See two, for example, in the National Palace Museum, Taipei, illustrated in Minji meihin zuroku, vol. II, Tokyo, 1977, pls.72 and 73, together with their blue-and-white counterparts, pls.70 and 71; and one in the Palace Museum, Beijing, illustrated in The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum: Blue and White Porcelain with Underglazed Red (II), Shanghai, 2000, pl.231, together with a Chenghua example, pl.230, and a Zhengde example, pl.233. Compare also with a dish in the Shanghai Museum included in the exhibition Chugoku rekidai toji ten/Chinese ceramics through the ages, Seibu Art Museum, Tokyo, 1984, no.80. Similar 'gardenia' dishes can also be found in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, illustrated in Oriental Ceramics: The World's Great Collections, vol.2, Tokyo, 1982, pl.16; the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities, Stockholm, op.cit., vol. 8, Tokyo, 1982, pl. 226, from the Kempe Collection. Another illustrated by R.Krahl, Chinese Ceramics from the Meiyintang Collection, London, 1994-2010, vol.4, no.1674, was sold at Sotheby's Hong Kong, 7th April 2011, lot 57. The example from the Sir Percival David Collection, now in the British Museum, London, is discussed by M.Medley, Illustrated Catalogue of Ming Polychrome Wares, London, 1966, no.A740.A similar dish was sold at Sotheby's Hong Kong, 8 October 2013, lot 226.