SOLD- 
A Splendid and Exceedingly Rare Early Ai-Kutani Japanese moulded dish with pie-crust rim and sharply undulating cavetto, superbly painted with flowering branches of Peony issuing from Rockwork, 17th century
Chokichidani kiln, Arita
early Edo period, Joo era (1652-55)
circa 1655
Measuring 20.3 cm (7.99 in) in diameter
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Literature: 
An identical dish in the Shibata Collection at the Kyushu Ceramic Museum, illustrated in Catalogue VII, no.111. 
Similar moulded porcelain dishes illustrated in Yamashita, Sakuro "Ai-Kutani to Ai-Kakiemon" (1983), and in Tsuchioka, K. "The Shibata Collection, vol.II, nos. 155-157.
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Provenance: 
A fine Private Collection, Kyushu, Japan
 
The exceptional finely potted white porcelain body of shallow circular form with a sharply moulded pie-crust rim dressed in iron brown fuchi-beni rim glaze with a superbly formed cavetto of undulating, spiralling form. 
 
The interior is boldly painted with a large central circular medallion depicting flowering branches of peony issuing from rockwork on a steep ground, the reverse encircled with a finely drawn double-lined scrolling hana-karakusa.
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A cobalt-blue Kaku-Fuku seal character on the reverse within a double square, the edge of the footring burnt red, thickly potted base.