Lot 2904. A fine blue and white ‘Grapes’ charger, Yongle period (1403-1425); 15 in. (38 cm.) diam. Estimate: HK$3,500,000.00 - HK$5,500,000.00 ((USD 448,612 - USD 704,962). Price realised HKD 8,740,000. © Christie's Images Ltd 2018. 

The dish is painted in rich vivid tones of cobalt blue with three branches of grapes suspended from slender vines bearing coiled tendrils and broad leaves, surrounded on the cavetto by a composite floral scroll comprising lotus, camellia, lily, aster, chrysanthemum, gardenia, morning glory and lingzhi on an undulating leafy stem. The design is repeated on the exterior, the slightly sloping everted rim decorated with a border of breaking waves, the base is unglazed, Japanese wood box.

Provenance: Kochukyo, Toyko
A Japanese private collection, acquired in the 1980s.

Note: Early Ming Imperial porcelains often show strong influences from Islamic or Central Asian cultures. The current ‘grapes’ dish is an excellent example. Grapes are among the plants that are recorded as having been brought to China from Central Asia by Zhang Qian, a returning envoy of Emperor Wu in 128 BC, and many different varieties of grape were grown in China by the early 15th century. Records show that both green and black grapes were grown by the beginning of the 6th century. Grapes rarely appear as decoration on Chinese art objects of the early period, but became a more popular motif in the Tang dynasty, when, again under Western influences, they were used regularly, for example, as part of the ubiquitous ‘lion and grape’ motif on bronze mirrors. It was in the early 15th century that grapes became a really popular motif on porcelains decorated in underglaze cobalt blue.