240.
A POLYCHROME ENAMELED DISH
Qing dynasty, Yongzheng period
24,3 cm diam
Provenance: Naples, Villa della Floridiana, Museo Duca di Martina, Placido de Sangro (1829-1891) collection.
inv. n. 5316.
The decoration consists of a reserve shaped as a partially unfolded scroll with a magpie on a blossoming prunus tree and some thin bamboos on the left.
The magpie (xique) is a symbol of good fortune because of the homophony of the first character of its name with xi meaning “happiness”; furthermore, it is also considered a messanger of good news. When depicted together with a prunus (mei), a symbol of the arrival of spring, the scene expresses a wish for joy.
The brilliant tones of the enamels and the arrangement of the elements of the decoration on this dish show clear similarities with Japanese Kakiemon wares from around 1700.
A dish with a similar style of decoration is in the Peabody Essex Museum (W.R. Sargent, Treasures of Chinese Export Ceramics from the Peabody Essex Museum, Yale 2012, p. 188, n. 87); see also the comparable example formerly in the Mottadeheded collection (D. Howard – J. Ayers, China for the West. Chinese Porcelain and other Decorative Arts for Export illustrated from the Mottahedeh Collection, 2 voll., London – New York 1978, I, n. 118), the one in the Reeves Center Collection (T.V. Litzenburg, Chinese Export Porcelain in the Reeves Center Collection at Washington and Lee University, Washington 2003, p. 78, n. 62) and the related dish in the Princesshof Museum, Leeuwarden (inv. NO 00500); a very similar dish belonged to the collection of Augustus the Strong, (1670-1733) now in the Porzellansammlung in Dresden (inv. PO 1001).
