Kenzan style tea bowl with inscription and design of narcissus

Tea-bowl, cylindrical; low basal ring.
Clay: stoneware; hard, grayish.
Glaze: transparent, appearing cream, with areas of gray and tan overflow; inside – appears gray; rim – line of iron brown.
Decoration: in metallic iron brown and dark cobalt blue, over white slip and under glaze.
Inscription:suishu okan (green sleeve, gold crown)
Signature: Kenzan Seisho
Seal: Toin

Maker(s)
Artist: Style of Ogata Kenzan (1663-1743) Kyoto workshop, Kenzan style
Historical period(s)
Edo period, mid to late 18th century
Medium
Buff clay with white slip, iron and cobalt pigments under transparent glaze
Style
Kyoto ware
Dimensions
H x Diam: 7.3 × 9.8 cm (2 7/8 × 3 7/8 in)
Geography
Japan, Kyoto prefecture, Kyoto
Credit Line
Gift of Charles Lang Freer
Collection
Freer Gallery of Art Collection
Accession Number
F1900.50
On View Location
Currently not on view
Classification(s)
Ceramic, Vessel
Type

Tea bowl

Keywords
Edo period (1615 - 1868), inscription, Japan, Kyoto ware, narcissus, tea
Provenance

To 1900
Hayashi Tadamasa (1853-1906), Paris, to 1900 [1]

From 1900 to 1919
Charles Lang Freer (1854-1919), purchased from Hayashi Tadamasa in 1900 [2]

From 1920
Freer Gallery of Art, gift of Charles Lang Freer in 1920 [3]

Notes:

[1] See Original Pottery List, L. 781, Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery Archives.

[2] See note 1.

[3] 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.

Previous Owner(s) and Custodian(s)

Hayashi Tadamasa (C.L. Freer source) 1853-1906
Charles Lang Freer 1854-1919

Description

Tea-bowl, cylindrical; low basal ring.
Clay: stoneware; hard, grayish.
Glaze: transparent, appearing cream, with areas of gray and tan overflow; inside - appears gray; rim - line of iron brown.
Decoration: in metallic iron brown and dark cobalt blue, over white slip and under glaze.
Inscription:suishu okan (green sleeve, gold crown)
Signature: Kenzan Seisho
Seal: Toin

Inscription(s)

suishu okan (green sleeve, gold crown)
翠袖黃冠

Marking(s)

Seal: Toin

Label

This bowl is decorated in the style introduced by the Kyoto potter Ogata Kenzan (1663–1743), who combined images and inscriptions in a manner more typical of a hanging scroll. A four-character Chinese-style inscription, from a poem on narcissus by the Southern Song neo-Confucian scholar Zhu Xi (1130–1200), reads “Green sleeves, gold crown.”

Published References
  • Don Pilcher. Looking at Kenzan., September 2002. p. 60.
  • Richard L. Wilson. The Potter's Brush: The Kenzan Style in Japanese Ceramics. Exh. cat. Washington. p. 73, fig. 12.
  • , no. 39 Lexington, Massachusetts, 2018. p. 148, fig. 22.
Collection Area(s)
Japanese Art
Web Resources
Google Cultural Institute
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