Item No.: 1039
Name: A large wucai dish with a courtroom scene
Period: Qing dynasty, Kangxi reign
Rim diameter: 44.8 cm
The scene appears to draw on the court-case fiction popular during the Ming and Qing dynasties. At the lower right, a woman in red, apparently the accused, stands below the steps beside a bailiff holding a ceremonial mace. She seems to be awaiting the final verdict.
At the center, six officials in robes of different colors stand behind a magistrate wearing an ochre robe and a square-topped hat. Their relaxed conversation and amused expressions suggest that the truth has already emerged. The magistrate calmly holds his belt with one hand and strokes his beard with the other, smiling with apparent confidence.
The woman’s posture offers a sharp contrast. With her arms crossed, jaw set, and eyes wide, she appears tense, proud, and defiant, seemingly prepared to resist even at the cost of her life. The Chinese commentary interprets the contrast between her anxiety and the officials’ ease as a subtle hint of a comic resolution.
Officials above the steps face a red-robed woman below. Their relatively open poses contrast with her hands held close to her chest, creating the tension of an awaited judgment. Read as a courtroom story, the dish evokes expectations of justice and demonstrates a theatrical arrangement of figures shared by performance, popular storytelling and ceramic painting.