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Hi
I bought this dish at auction two weeks ago. I would like to hear your thoughts on it. Thanks

Your dish appears to me to be consistent with the palette, potting, firing characteristics, wear patterns and markings of other Guangxu Period porcelains I've seen and handled, so I'm as confident as anyone can be from looking at pictures that you are correct in calling your dish of the period. The pattern, with phoenixes and/or dragons materializing from the flora, was particularly popular on 19th century bowls, beginning from the Daoguang Reign(1821-50). Examples are illustrated in the German Weishaupt Collection catalog, "From the Dragon's Treasure - Vom Schatz der Drachen".

I reviewed the Christie's archives for the past couple of decades and found about a half dozen Guangxu M&P bowls and one lot from 2001 with pairs of saucers and larger plates in the pattern shown in the photo here. The couple of lots that pictured enlargeable marks on bowls showed a calligraphic style in the underglaze blue & white characters that was quite close to what's seen on your dish. Some of the marks reflected variations in cobalt saturation, normal for the period, such as hollow lines.

Below are links to three of the Christie's auctions, which hopefully will work when pasted in your browser.

https://www.christies.com/lotfinder/lot/a-pair-of-chinese-porcelain-famille-rose-5389530-details.aspx?

https://www.christies.com/lotfinder/lot/a-pair-of-famille-rose-phoenix-bowls-5891380-details.aspx?

https://www.christies.com/lotfinder/lot/a-pair-of-famille-rose-saucer-dishes-4164987-details.aspx?

Best regards,

Bill H.

The colors and artwork look good to me for late 19th Century, but the mark and flawless nature of the glaze might make it later.

The bottom glaze is a bit more free of flaws than average, although there's some apparent shrinkage off the foot at about 11 o'clock in the third picture. Also some of the specks in the upper surface glaze look more or less as expected.

As for the mark, I suspect that even the minyao kilns paid more attention to marks on their reproductions of imperial patterns, as may be the case here. I have a Guangxu mark & period example of a Buddhist "Eight Treasures" (Babao) platter (images below), regarding which some of my gurus support my belief that it is one of the palace pieces made at the Imperial Kiln for presentation to deserving graduates of the Imperial examination system. Its mark is quite evenly written, though variations in brush pressure are visible, as is the case with the dish here, but harder to see because the image lacks fine focus

Best regards,

Bill H.

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