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Dish of saucer shape with rounded sides, the undercut, unglazed base with chatter marks. On the interior in a landscape with steep rocky islands, pagodas, gates and houses, two figures, one on a mule, crossing a bridge, and cranes atop a pine tree. The well plain, the rim with a border of herons in a lotus pond. The outside with four pomegranate branches with squirrels and lingzhi fungus motifs, a scroll around the foot.
The scene on this dish is expressively rendered. The plain well forces the viewer to concentrate on the central medallion. He is drawn into the landscape focussing on the scholar on his mule crossing a bridge over the river. Two men in a boat are slowly traversing the water. Rocks with gates and pagodas, and dwellings with flagpoles rise from the mist in the background. Lively scenes of nature became an important subject matter on export porcelains in the later years of the Jiajing reign. This type of dish was exported on a large scale and is found in collections in the Middle East like the Topkapi Saray in Istanbul and the Ardebil, in the Bastan Museum in Teheran. The variations on this theme attest to the freedom of the decorations. A similar example is in the Van Diepen collection, while another one with an identical outside decoration as the Princessehof dish is in the Santos Palace in Lisbon.
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