Christie's. Fine Chinese Ceramics & Works of Art, New York, 22 March 2019
A rare white-glazed biscuit-decorated 'dragon' dish,Hongzhi six-character mark in underglaze blue within a double circle and of
Lot 1626. A rare white-glazed biscuit-decorated 'dragon' dish,Hongzhi six-character mark in underglaze blue within a double circle and of the period (1488-1505); 8 7/8 in. (22.5 cm.) diam. Estimate USD 50,000 - USD 70,000. © Christie's Images Ltd 2019
Finely potted with shallow, rounded sides, the dish is incised on the interior with a dragon leaping amidst clouds, and on the exterior with two further dragons striding on a ground of waves crashing on rocks, all reserved in the biscuit that has fired to a very pale russet color and surrounded by the unctuous glaze of pale milky-blue tone.
Provenance: Sotheby's Hong Kong, 10 April 2006, lot 1616.
Note: Dishes of this type with Hongzhi mark, but of smaller size, include one (19.8 cm.) in the British Museum, illustrated by J. Harrison-Hall, Ming Ceramics, London, 2001, pp. 177-78, no. 7:3, where the author, p. 178, notes that "large numbers of these dishes were commissioned by the imperial court during the Hongzhi reign." Another smaller dish (16.2 cm.) in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, is illustrated by Suzanne G. Valenstein, A Handbook of Chinese Ceramics, New York, 1989 ed., pl. 155; and one (18.5 cm.) in the National Palace Museum, Taiwan, is illustrated in Porcelain of The National Palace Museum: Monochrome Ware of the Ming Dynasty, Book, 2, Hong Kong, 1968, pp. 110-11, pls. 2-2c.