Tea bowl

Tea bowl, on high foot. Repaired with gold lacquer.
Clay: cream-white, porcelanous, buff gray surface where exposed apparently is dirt and stain.
Glaze: transparent, fine crackle, stained; edge of foot, base and ring inside unglazed; brown wash inside foot and on base is typical “chocolate base” of Annamese ware. It is probable that a white slip is under the glaze.
Decoration: painted in inferior (grayish) cobalt blue under the glaze, single stroke. Outside, single chrysanthemums scroll band with leaves in small scale above band of lotus panels. Inside, narrow band of small repeated indistinct pattern at lip, and in center bottom a very cursive character, possibly Fu, enclosed in ring.

Historical period(s)
Later Le, Mac, or Restored Later Le dynasty, 1500-1600
Medium
Stoneware with cobalt pigment under clear glaze
Dimensions
H x Diam: 10.4 × 13.2 cm (4 1/8 × 5 3/16 in)
Geography
Vietnam, Hai Duong province, Red River Delta kilns
Credit Line
Gift of Charles Lang Freer
Collection
Freer Gallery of Art
Accession Number
F1902.13
On View Location
Currently not on view
Classification(s)
Ceramic, Vessel
Type

Tea bowl

Keywords
Later Le dynasty (1428 - 1527), lotus, Mac dynasty (1527 - 1592), Restored Later Le dynasty (1533 - 1782), stoneware, tea, Vietnam
Provenance

To 1902
Yamanaka & Company, to 1902 [1]

From 1902 to 1919
Charles Lang Freer (1854-1919), purchased from Yamanaka & Company in 1902 [2]

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

Notes:

[1] See Original Pottery List, L. 1088, Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery Archives. The majority of Charles Lang Freer’s purchases from Yamanaka & Company were made at its New York branch. Yamanaka & Company maintained branch offices, at various times, in Boston, Chicago, London, Peking, Shanghai, Osaka, Nara, and Kyoto. During the summer, the company also maintained seasonal locations in Newport, Bar Harbor, and Atlantic City.

[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)

Charles Lang Freer 1854-1919
Yamanaka and Co. (C.L. Freer source) 1917-1965

Description

Tea bowl, on high foot. Repaired with gold lacquer.
Clay: cream-white, porcelanous, buff gray surface where exposed apparently is dirt and stain.
Glaze: transparent, fine crackle, stained; edge of foot, base and ring inside unglazed; brown wash inside foot and on base is typical "chocolate base" of Annamese ware. It is probable that a white slip is under the glaze.
Decoration: painted in inferior (grayish) cobalt blue under the glaze, single stroke. Outside, single chrysanthemums scroll band with leaves in small scale above band of lotus panels. Inside, narrow band of small repeated indistinct pattern at lip, and in center bottom a very cursive character, possibly Fu, enclosed in ring.

Label

Bowls of this distinctive shape with a high, cylindrical foot were made at kilns in northern Vietnam.

Published References
  • Louise Allison Cort, George Williams, David P. Rehfuss. Ceramics in Mainland Southeast Asia. Washington. .
  • Louise Allison Cort. Seto and Mino Ceramics. Washington and Honolulu, 1992. p. 54, fig. 15.
  • John Stevenson, John Guy, Louise Allison Cort. Vietnamese Ceramics: A Separate Tradition. Chicago. p. 70, fig. 6.
Collection Area(s)
Southeast Asian Art
Web Resources
Ceramics in Mainland Southeast Asia
Google Cultural Institute
F|S Southeast Asia
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