KANGXI PERIOD (1662-1722)

Two of the three figures on the present dish can be identified by the signs suspending from their belts as characters from the popular novel Shuihu Zhuan: The figure on the right holding a sword is Liu Tang, standing opposite Dai Zong holding a polearm. This dish belongs to a set of decorated dishes similarly inspired by Chen Hongshou's illustrations in The Water Margin, published in 1657. A distinct feature of these dishes is the absence of any backdrop or complementary pattern in the background. Compare to a set of four similar decorated dishes in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, one illustrated in Rose Kerr, Chinese Ceramics: Porcelain of the Qing Dynasty 1644-1911, London, 1986, p. 102-103, no. 81. Another dish from the Shanghai Museum is illustrated by Wang Qingzheng, Kangxi Porcelain Wares from the Shanghai Museum Collection, Hong Kong, 1998, p. 305, no. 132. Compare also to another dish sold at Christie's New York, Marchant: Nine Decades in Chinese Art, 14 September 2017, lot 741.