TWO RARE BLUE AND WHITE SHONZUI-STYLE CIRCULAR SERVING DISHES

PROPERTY FROM THE ESTATE OF DR. WALTER COMPTON

细节

TWO RARE BLUE AND WHITE SHONZUI-STYLE CIRCULAR SERVING DISHES
CHONGZHEN

With irregularly scalloped rim, possibly suggesting a flower-head in profile, each densely painted in the center in a rich violet-blue with four single characters in a vertical line and two long-tailed birds, one perched in a small blossoming plum tree issuing from a group of rocks while the other is in flight above, all reserved on a checkered ground of wan emblems and starbursts, within a border with alternating panels of decorative patterns, animals, tree branches, animals and sun or moon disks, all below a brown-dressed rim, the reverse with a continuous floral scroll, each base with a fu seal mark in underglaze blue--7 3/4 in. (19.8cm.) diam., wood box (2)

拍品专文

The characters read xi bao chun dou (magpies portend the arrival of early signs of Spring). These dishes would therefore be appropriate for a New Year tea ceremony, where the allusion to plum blossom would be very recognizable

Compare a similar example in the Tokyo National Museum, illustrated in the Catalogue of Chinese Ceramics, 1965, p. 115. no. 478, and another illustrated in The Effie B. Allison Collection: Ko-sometsuke and other Chinese Blue-and-White Porcelain, Asian Art Musuem of San Francisco, March-June 1982, Catalogue, no. 36, and discussed by her in the article, "Chinese Ceramics for the Japanese Tea Masters", Arts of Asia, March-April, 1987. See also the example from The Peony Pavilion Collection sold Christie's London, June 12, 1989, lot 222, front cover illustration