224.
AN ‘IMARI’ DISH
Qing dynasty, Kangxi period, early 18th century
34,8 cm diam
Provenance: Naples, Villa della Floridiana, Museo Duca di Martina, Placido de Sangro (1829-1891) collection.
inv. n. 4721.
Painted in underglaze blue, red enamel and touches of gold, the decoration consists of a round medallion to the centre with a lakeside landscape with trees, mountains, clouds pavilions and a pagoda, the same elements arranged also around the main scene and on the rim where the decoration is interrupted by four fan-shaped panels with floral compositions.
A series of twenty-three dishes with a similar decoration belonged to the Medici family, now in Palazzo Pitti in Florence (F. Morena, Dalle Indie orientali alla corte di Toscana. Collezioni di arte cinese e giapponese a Palazzo Pitti, Florence 2005, p. 271, n. 221); see also the comparable pieces in the Topkapi Saray Museum in Istanbul (R. Krahl, Chinese Ceramics in the Topkapi Saray Museum, Istanbul, 3 voll., London 1986, III, p. 1211, n. 2990-2991) and the series in the Landesmuseum in Kassel (Porzellan aus China und Japan. Die Porzellansalerie der Landgrafen von Hessen-Kassel, exhibition catalogue (Kassel), Berlin 1990, p. 358, n. 141a-d).
This decoration was introduced in the repertory of the Felice Clerici manufacture of ceramic in Milan in around 1760 (S. Levy, Le maioliche di Milano, Milan 1969, pl. 25).
