A Ming-style Blue and White dish. Qianlong Seal Mark And Period. Photo Sotheby's

painted with a carefully drawn pattern of a composite floral band bearing different stylized flowerheads including lotus, peony, camellia and chrysanthemum on continuous scrolling stems with varied foliage around the interior and exterior and in the central medallion, a border of classic scroll below the rim on the interior repeated above the foot on the exterior and a wide band of key-fret below the lipped rim, seal mark in underglaze blue. Diameter 15 7/8 in., 40.3 cm - ESTIMATION 120,000-180,000 USD

NOTE DE CATALOGUE: The dish is based on an early Ming dynasty prototype. Comparable Ming Dynasty examples of this dish include one illustrated by J. A. Pope, Chinese Ceramics in the Ardebil Shrine, Washington, 1956, pl. 36, 29.119; one in the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities, Stockholm, illustrated in Oriental Ceramics, Kodansha Series, vol. 9, Japan, 1981, pl. 215, formerly from the Gustav VI Adolf Collection, no. 1940.

Sotheby's. Fine Chinese Ceramics & Works of Art, New York | 11 sept. 2012 www.sothebys.com