Object Details
- Description
- Clay: grayish stoneware fired red.
- Glaze: tan with dark grayish areas, crackled.
- Decoration: flower sprays, rock and butterflies in underglaze blue.
- Label
- The Arita kilns are best known for producing white-bodied porcelain decorated with cobalt in the Chinese style. This unusual tea bowl combines cobalt designs with a dark stoneware body. Applying white clay solution over the dark body produced a muted “antique” appearance further emphasized by the crackle in the glaze. This type of ware appears to have been produced at Arita kilns during a brief period and for an audience of tea ceramic connoisseurs.
- Provenance
- Ikeda Seisuke (1839-1900), Kyoto [1]
- To 1900
- Bunkio Matsuki (1867-1940), Boston, to 1900 [2]
- From 1900 to 1919
- Charles Lang Freer (1854-1919), purchased from Bunkio Matsuki in 1900 [3]
- From 1920
- Freer Gallery of Art, gift of Charles Lang Freer in 1920 [4]
- Notes:
- [1] According to Curatorial Remark 1 in the object record.
- [2] See Original Pottery List, L. 806, Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery Archives.
- [3] See note 2.
- [4] The original deed of Charles Lang Freer's gift was signed in 1906. The collection was received in 1920 upon the completion of the Freer Gallery.
- Collection
- Freer Gallery of Art Collection
- Exhibition History
- Tea Bowls in Bloom: Botanical Decoration on Tea Ceremony Ceramics (February 3 to July 15, 2007)
- Previous custodian or owner
- Ikeda Seisuke (1839-1900)
- Bunkio Matsuki 松木文恭 (1867-1940) (C.L. Freer source)
- Charles Lang Freer (1854-1919)
- Data Source
- Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery
- Date
- 1660-1700
- Period
- Edo period
- Credit Line
- Gift of Charles Lang Freer
- Medium
- Stoneware with white slip and cobalt pigment under clear glaze
- Dimensions
- H x Diam: 8 × 12.4 cm (3 1/8 × 4 7/8 in)
- Style
- Arita ware, totai sometsuke type
- Type
- Vessel
