Chinese Porcelain Famille Verte Large "Flower Basket" Dish, Kangxi Period

Details

Description

Chinese Export Porcelain Famille Verte Large Flower Basket Dish
Kangxi Period, Circa 1700–1710

This large Chinese export porcelain dish is … Read more Chinese Export Porcelain Famille Verte Large Flower Basket Dish
Kangxi Period, Circa 1700–1710

This large Chinese export porcelain dish is painted in the famille verte palette with a central medallion of a flower basket. The basket has an arched handle tied with a ribbon and a woven rim, and holds peonies, chrysanthemums and other flowers; its ribbed body is centered with a stylized shou (longevity) roundel and stands on a blue foot. The medallion is framed by a band of turquoise-green ground dotted in black and scattered with iron-red and white flowerheads.

Eight petal-shaped panels radiate across the cavetto, each painted with flowering plants, including peony, chrysanthemum and prunus, growing beside pierced garden rocks. The panels are divided by the same dotted turquoise ground and its flowerheads. The shaped rim carries eight white cartouches edged in blue, each holding one of the precious objects, such as a lozenge or a beribboned pearl. They alternate with diaper panels in several patterns: green trellis enclosing iron-red flowerheads, an interlaced lattice and a wan-fret ground.

The palette runs from pale lime through emerald to turquoise green, with iron-red, a violet-blue overglaze enamel and touches of aubergine, all outlined in black. The reverse is painted on the border with three iron-red and green flowering sprays and a small green sprig. The base has a flower spray within a double circle in underglaze blue, and the footring shows the usual small kiln-grit adhesions from the firing.

A dish of this size shows well on a plate stand on a sideboard or console, or hung above a mantel. Its greens and iron-red sit comfortably with blue and white porcelain, oak and walnut furniture, and traditional or collected interiors.

Dimensions
Diameter: 14 1/4 inches (36.2 cm)
Height: 1 1/2 inches (3.8 cm)

Marks
A flower spray within a double circle in underglaze blue on the base, in place of a reign mark.

Provenance
Earle D. Vandekar of Knightsbridge

Condition
Good, with wear consistent with age and use; a small chip on the reverse at six o'clock does not extend to the rim edge.

References
Sotheby's New York, Saturday at Sotheby's: Chinese Art, 21 March 2015, lot 657: a famille verte flower basket dish, Kangxi period, with eight radiating petal-shaped floral panels (artemisia leaf mark).
Christiaan J. A. Jörg, Chinese Ceramics in the Collection of the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam: The Ming and Qing Dynasties (London: Philip Wilson, 1997).
David Howard and John Ayers, China for the West: Chinese Porcelain and Other Decorative Arts for Export (London and New York: Sotheby Parke Bernet, 1978).

Historical Context
The term famille verte comes from the classification of Chinese porcelain by palette devised by the French collector Albert Jacquemart in the 1860s; in China the palette is called Kangxi wucai. It developed at Jingdezhen after the kilns were rebuilt early in the Kangxi reign (1662–1722), as transparent greens came to dominate and a violet-blue overglaze enamel took the place of underglaze cobalt within enameled designs. The private kilns that supplied the domestic market also made large dishes like this one for export, and the Dutch and English East India Companies and private traders brought them to Europe. The flower basket is the attribute of Lan Caihe, one of the Eight Immortals, and together with the shou roundel and the precious objects of the border it carries conventional wishes for long life and good fortune.

(Ref: NY10154-inrr) See less