Lot 105. A rare underglaze-blue and yellow-enamelled 'lotus bouquet' charger, mark and period of Yongzheng (1723-1735); 39.6 cm, 15 1/2  in. Estimate 600,000 — 800,000 HKD (76,398 - 101,864 USD). Lot sold 2,250,000 HKD (286,493 USD). Courtesy Sotheby's.

rising from a short tapered foot to a lipped rim, painted in various shades of cobalt blue against a bright yellow ground, the interior with a beribboned bouquet of lotus and other water plants, encircled by a composite floral scroll, all below a classic scroll border, the exterior similarly decorated with a slightly different composite floral scroll, between key-fret and classic scroll bands, the base enamelled yellow and inscribed in underglaze blue with a six-character reign mark within a double circle reserved on white, wood stand. 

Note: Both the lotus-bouquet design of this dish and the yellow and blue colour scheme are borrowed from early Ming prototypes that were developed at the Jingdezhen imperial kilns in the Yongle and Xuande periods. The combination is, however, not known from the Ming period.

In the Yongzheng and Qianlong reigns this design was revived and produced in various dimensions, the present dish being of the largest size, of which only three others appear to have been sold at auction, one in our London rooms, 2nd March 1971, lot 190; another at Christie's London, 10th July 1978, lot 47; and a third sold at Christie's New York, 2nd December 1986, lot 206 and more recently in these rooms, 7th April 2011, lot 74, from the Meiyintang collection.

Compare also three smaller related examples, one illustrated in John Ayers, Chinese Ceramics. The Koger Collection, London, 1985, pl. 122; two from the collection of Edward T. Chow, sold in these rooms, 19th May 1981, lots 583 and 584, the latter also from the collection or Sir Quo-Wei Lee, more recently sold in these rooms, 3rd October 2018, lot 108.

For the blue and white Yongle prototypes see two dishes from the Meiyintang collection, illustrated in Regina Krahl, Chinese Ceramics from the Meiyintang Collection, London, 1994-2010, vol. 2, nos 665 and 666.