Bowl with fluted walls (kiln waster)

1960s-?
Dr. Sarah M. Bekker (1923-2013), collected from Phan kiln site, Thailand [1]

?-2015
Mr. and Mrs. Victor (1919-2013) and Takako Hauge (1923-2015), gift from Dr. Sarah M. Bekker [2]

2015-2018
Daniel and Sachi Rosenbaum, by descent from Mr. and Mrs. Victor and Takako Hauge [3]

From 2018
Freer Gallery of Art, Freer Study Collection, gift of Daniel and Sachi Rosenbaum [4]

Notes:
[1] See acquisition justification by Louise Cort, “Justification for RLS2017.19.7 and RLS2017.19.9.1,” May 9, 2018, copy in object file. Cort’s justification states, “The bowl from the Phan kiln site in Northern Thailand is marked with blue plastic tape – indication that the sherd originally belonged to Dr. Sarah Bekker, who lived in Thailand in the 1960s and who gave a number of sherds to the Hauges.”

See also “Gift Consideration” form, dated May 10, 2018, p. 2. On the form Cort states that the object “was collected at site by Sarah Bekker in 1960s.”

In 2001, Victor and Takako Hauge donated their collection of sherds to the Freer Study Collection, and it was their intent to donate their complete collection of sherds the museum. In the summer 2017, the Hauges’ heirs, Daniel and Sachi Rosenbaum, discovered this stray sherd still inside of the Hauge home. Mr. and Mrs. Rosenbaum then offered the sherd as a gift to the museum in 2017, in keeping with the Hauges’ original intent. See Cort’s acquisition justification.

Sachi Rosenbaum is Takako Hauge’s great niece. See notes by Louise Cort, “Information transcribed from notes taken during visits to the home of Victor and Taka Hauge […] and the adjacent ‘Southeast Asia House,’ 1 June 2001. Conversation with Osborne (Bud) Hauge and with Victor and Taka Hauge,” dated 2001-2013, p. 3, copy in object file.

Dr. Sarah M. Bekker was a noted scholar, author, and lecturer on Asian art, with special interests in Thai art and the peoples and art of Burma. Along with her husband, Konrad Bekker, an Economics Officer with the U.S. Department of State, she lived in India, Burma, and Thailand, and the couple was able to pursue their shared interest in the arts. In 1964, Dr. Bekker received her Ph.D. in Social Psychology from the George Washington University, on a topic relating to Burmese concepts of duty, obligation, and "face." Her professional work included scholarly articles, book reviews, and slide lectures and presentations at Asian art focused organizations throughout the US and abroad. The Bekkers' collection of Burmese art forms the core of the Burmese art collection at the Center for Burma Studies, Northern Illinois University. Other gifts reside in the Denison Museum at Ohio’s Denison University and the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco.

The Hauge family began collecting Asian paintings, sculpture, and ceramics in the late 1940s and would amass a large collection in the post-World War II years.

[2] See Cort’s acquisition justification. See also Cort’s notes, p. 7.

[3] See Cort’s acquisition justification.

[4] See Deed of Gift, dated July 6, 2018, copy in object file.

Research updated December 15, 2022