Lot 1854. An early Ming blue and white 'Grapes' dish, Yongle period (1403-1425), 14 7/8 in. (37.7 cm.) diam. Estimate HKD 2,500,000 - HKD 3,500,000. Price Realized HKD 3,020,000 © Christie's Images Ltd 2010

Sturdily potted with shallow, gently rounded sides rising to an angled everted rim, painted in vivid graduated tones of underglaze-blue with three clusters of grapes suspended from slender branches bearing coiling tendrils and broad leaves, all enclosed within a double-circle, the cavetto encircled by a continuous composite floral scroll, repeated with slight variations to the exterior, with twelve blooms including lotus, camellia, lily, aster, chrysanthemum, gardenia, morning glory and lingzhi on an undulating leafy stem, the flattened rim with a border of crested waves, the smooth unglazed base burnt slightly orange, the purplish blue cobalt with characteristic 'heaping and piling' effect and the glaze with an even soft blue tinge, box.

Provenance: A New England collection. 

Note: Compare with similar examples in well-known collections including one from the Robert Chang collection sold at Christie's Hong Kong, 28 November 2006, lot 1313; an example illustrated in Exhibition of Blue and White Wares, Shanghai Museum, Catalogue, no. 24; a dish formerly in the Gustav VI Adolf collection, and now in the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities, Stockholm, illustrated in Oriental Ceramics, Kodansha series, vol. 9, Tokyo, 1976, pl. 216; an example in the Percival David Foundation, London, illustrated in op. cit., Kodansha series, vol. 6, Tokyo, 1982, pl. 74; one from the T. Y. Chao and R. E. R. Luff collections exhibited at the Hong Kong Museum of Art, Ming and Ching Porcelain in the Collection of the T. Y. Chao Family Foundation, illustrated in the Catalogue, 1978, no. 3; another from the Topkapi Museum, Istanbul, illustrated by R. Krahl, Chinese Ceramics in the Topkapi Saray Museum, vol. 2, London, 1986, no. 606; and five examples in the Ardebil Shrine collection, one of which is illustrated by John Alexander Pope, Chinese Ceramics from the Ardebil Shrine, Washington, 1956, pl. 38 29.52. An example originally in the possession of Empress Dowager Cixi and Sir Robert Hart was sold at Christie's Hong Kong, 3 December 2008, lot 2245.

 Large serving dish with flowers and grapes, Ming dynasty, Yongle reign, AD1403–1424, Jingdezhen, Jiangxi province. Porcelain with underglaze cobalt-blue decoration. Sir Percival David Foundation of Chinese Art, PDF.685 © 2017 Trustees of the British Museum

Christie's. The Imperial Sale Important Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art, 31 May 2010, Hong Kong