Bottle

Label Text

The Peacock Room, originally the dining room in the home of Frederick R. Leyland, was intended to showcase its owner's extensive collection of Chinese blue-and -white porcelain. Among his 300-plus pieces were examples similar to this vessel. Known as Kangxi ware, these pots were produced in the Jingdezhen region during the Kangxi reign (1662-1722). They became so popular with Victorian consumers that the press mockingly dubbed the craze "Chinamania."

When Charles Lang Freer purchased the Peacock Room in London in 1904, it had already been emptied of its blue-and-white porcelains. Freer, in any case, did not care for their slick surfaces and bright glazes. Beginning in the 1980s, the Freer Gallery of Art began to acquire blue-and-whites for display in the Peacock Room, in an effort to evoke the chromatic relationships and pictorial patterns that inspired Whistler and his contemporaries.

Object Name

Bottle

Dated

early 17th century

Period

Ming dynasty

Medium

Porcelain with cobalt pigment under clear glaze

Dimensions

HxWxD: 27.5 x 14.9 x 14.9 cm

City

Jingdezhen

Country

China

Credit Line

Gift of the Lydman Collection

Iteration

1

Shelf Number

72

Wall

East

Title

Bottle

Object Number

F1992.33

Image

http://141.217.97.109/plugins/Dropbox/files/peacock-jpg/JPEG/F1992.33.jpg

Collection

Citation

"Bottle," in The Peacock Room, Freer Gallery of Art, Smithsonian Institution, Accession No. F1992.33, Item #3170, http://peacockroom.wayne.edu/items/show/3170 (accessed March 19, 2024).