44. M4404
£14,500
Description
Chinese porcelain blue and white deep saucer dish of shonzui style with fluted body, hariki petal-shape needle-point rim, painted on a blue ground with two phoenix birds, one standing beside a tree with peony blossom, rockwork, fruiting lingzhi and three precious objects, the other phoenix behind the rock looking back at its mate, encircled by six ruyi-head lappets of aster, camellia and magnolia, all beneath a brown-dressed rim, the underside with a continuous branch of morning glory flowers and buds, the base with a six-character mark of Chenghua within a double ring.
9 inches, 22.9 cm diameter.
Chongzhen, 1628-1644.
Provenance & Additional Information
- Formerly in a Japanese private collection, Tokyo.
- Included by Marchant in their exhibition of Kosometsuke & Shonzui, 2024, no. 44, pp. 116/117.
- An identical dish is illustrated by Yamaguchi and Yoshikawa in the YY Collection Exhibition catalogue of Rediscovering Nagasaki, 2014, p. 15.
- A shard discovered at Jingdezhen No. 3 Middle School kiln site from the Tianqi/Chongzhen strata of a related blue-ground dish, the centre with birds, is illustrated by Huang Qing Hua in Colorful Japan – the Special Exhibition of the Ordered Porcelains at the End of Ming Dynasty from Japan, 2021, which relates to discoveries from this period at Jingdezhen, p. 120.
- This group of wares is often described as shonzui. To quote David Freedman in the Marchant exhibition catalogue, Two Hundred Years of Chinese Porcelain 1522-1722, 1998, no. 44, p. 59, “There is little agreement as to the origin or significance of the term, but it appears to encompass a number of well made pieces produced in China for the Japanese market. Such pieces are deemed to have some or all of a number of characteristics, including strong, interesting forms, good blue, geometric motifs, medallions, figures in landscapes and a brown-washed rim”.
- For a further discussion by Soame Jenyns on this terminology and dating, see The Chinese Kosometsuke and Shonsui Wares in Transactions of the Oriental Ceramic Society, vol. 34, 1962-1963, pp. 13-50.
- Another shonzui-style deep dish with similar rim painted with two cranes was included by Christie’s London in their auction of The Peony Pavilion Collection: Chinese Tea Ceramics for Japan (c.1580/1650), 12th June 1989, lot 221.
- A related saucer dish of this size is illustrated by John Ayers in The Baur Collection, Chinese Ceramics, Volume II, no. A228.
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