Provenance: Acquired in Japan, 1980s.

Note: In the catalogue for the exhibition of ceramics from the Idemitsu Museum, In Pursuit of the Dragon: Traditions and Transitions in Ming Ceramics, Seattle Art Museum, 1988, p. 98, Mary Ann Rogers discusses this group of dishes with distinctive decoration made beginning in the Xuande period and continuing through the 15th and 16th centuries. The Idemitsu collection has examples from each of the five reign eras during which the type was produced, and the group is largely consistent with just a few minor differences in the treatment of flowers and fruit.

Other examples with Zhengde marks are in some of the world’s greatest collections, including the collection of the Percival David Foundation, illustrated by M. Medley, Illustrated Catalogue of Ming Polychrome Wares, London, 1978, pl. III, no. 29 and in the Smithsonian Institution, illustrated in Ming Porcelains in the Freer Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1953, p. 35, nos. 31 and 32. 

Dish with gardenia, Ming dynasty, Zhengde six-character mark in a double circle in underglaze blue on the base and period, AD 1506–1521, Porcelain with underglaze blue decoration and yellow glaze, Jingdezhen, Jiangxi province. On loan from Sir Percival David Foundation of Chinese Art, PDF A743 © Trustees of the British Museum.

Dish with spray of gardenias, Zhengde mark and period (1506-1521). Porcelain with cobalt decoration under colorless glaze and enamel over the glaze, Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, F1953.7. © 2018 Smithsonian