Tea bowl with brushed-slip decoration

Tea bowl

This Korean tea bowl with its cream colored glaze was purchased by Freer in 1897 from the New York branch of Yamanaka and Company, where he was a regular customer. That year, he purchased a number of similarly earth-toned bowls from the shop on Fifth Avenue. More than a decade later, he arrayed a number of them along the top of the mantel in the Peacock Room, just beneath Whistler's painting <i>La Princesse du pays de la porcelaine.</i>

16th century

Gift of Charles Lang Freer

Yamanaka and Co.

Stoneware with white slip under clear glaze

Buncheong ware

HxW: 7.8 x 18.3 cm

F1897.64

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2

31

North

Joseon period

Korea

United States

New York

New York

Tea bowl, Totoya type

Tea bowl

This comparatively large bowl with straight flaring sides dates to the sixteenth or seventeenth century and was probably made by a Korean potter working in the Karatsu area of Japan. (Karatsu had a long history as a port of trade with both Korean and China.) Freer purchased the piece from Yamanaka and Company in New York in 1898. Ten years later, he displayed it on the mantel of the Peacock Room with a number of other tea bowls acquired from the same dealer.

late 16th-early 17th century

Gift of Charles Lang Freer

Yamanaka and Co.

Stoneware with brushed-slip decoration under feldspathic glaze

HxW: 7.0 x 17.0 cm

F1898.87

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2

30

North

Joseon period

Korea

United States

New York

New York

Tea bowl

Tea bowl

Waegwan (Wakan) kiln

In the late 1890s, Freer acquired a number of simple, earth-toned tea bowls from the New York branch of Yamanaka and Company, where the collector was a regular customer. He believed this bowl, with its gray yellow-brown glaze and fine dark crackle, was from Japan. Scholars have since debated its origins, wondering if it were perhaps from Korea, not Japan as Freer thought. The most recent thinking is that this bowl is indeed Korean, dating from the Joseon period in the seventeenth century.

17th century

Gift of Charles Lang Freer

Yamanaka and Co.

Stoneware with ash glaze

Busan ware

HxW: 8.6 x 14.7 cm

F1898.461

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2

29

North

Joseon period

Busan

Korea

United States

New York

New York

Tea bowl

Tea bowl

The Englishman James Lord Bowes (1834-1899), who once owned this bowl, began collecting Japanese ceramics at the 1867 Paris Exposition. This piece was an anomaly in his collection, which tended toward elaborate enamel-decorated export wares from Satsuma, Kutani, and Kyoto. Its simplicity and crackled, greenish-brown glaze were, however, very much in keeping with Freer's taste. In 1908, Freer displayed it with an array of similar tea bowls on the mantel beneath Whistler's painting <i>La Princesse du pays de la porcelaine.</i>

late 15th-early 16th century

Gift of Charles Lang Freer

R. Wagner

Stoneware with ash glaze

Mino or Seto ware

HxWxD: 6.6 x 16.4 x 16.4 cm

F1901.49

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2

28

North

Muromachi period

Japan

Germany

Berlin

Tea bowl

Tea bowl

Undae-ri kilns

Korean ceramics such as this small bowl reached Japan through international trade. Their arrival coincided with efforts by Japanese practitioners of the tea ceremony to replace formal Chinese ceramics with a more intimate assemblage of tea utensils. In Korea, this small bowl might have been used for serving pickles or other condiments; in Japan, however, it was used as for tea, as indicated by the ring of brown tea-stain around the rim. In the course of use, the overall coating of white slip turned to dark ivory. This alteration in appearance was an especially prized feature of the undecorated bowls. Their shape and surface qualities had a lasting impact on Japanese preferences in ceramics.

second half of 16th century

Gift of Charles Lang Freer

Yamanaka and Co.

Stoneware with white slip under clear glaze

Buncheong ware, Undae-ri type

HxW: 5.7 x 12.8 cm

F1898.71

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2

27

North

Joseon period

Korea

United States

New York

New York

Tea bowl

Tea bowl

Freer purchased this Japanese tea bowl from the New York branch of Yamanaka and Company, whose Fifth Avenue shop was an important source of Japanese and Chinese art for many American collectors at the turn of the century. This piece was one of more than twenty-five tea bowls that Freer acquired from Yamanaka in 1897. He displayed several of them in the Peacock Room in Detroit, where he organized them alongside Whistler's painting <i>La Princesse du pays de la porcelaine.</i>

18th-19th century

Gift of Charles Lang Freer

Yamanaka and Co.

Stoneware with ash glaze

Possibly Hagi ware

HxW: 10.4 x 11.6 cm

F1897.68

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2

15

North

Edo period

Japan

United States

New York

New York

Tea bowl

Tea bowl

This shallow, amber-glazed tea bowl is dated to the third quarter of the sixteenth century Muromachi or Momoyama period, and is associated with the historic <i>ogama</i> production phases of the Mino kilns of Japan. At the time of production, iron was added to the ash glaze to enrich its coloration; over time, dregs of tea stained the bowl, giving it an even warmer finish. Freer purchased this bowl in 1898, on New York's Fifth Avenue, from Yamanaka and Company, noting that it was "extremely rare-very early." The shape of this tea bowl is termed <i>hirawan</i> and the vessel would traditionally be placed on a lacquer stand. In the Peacock Room in Detroit, however, it appeared on a shelf to the left of <i>La Princesse du Pays de la porcelaine.</i>

third quarter 16th century

Gift of Charles Lang Freer

Yamanaka and Co.

Stoneware with iron slip under ash glaze; gold lacquer repairs

Mino ware

HxWxD: 5.7 x 15.9 x 15.9 cm

F1898.465

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2

9

North

Muromachi or Momoyama period

Japan

United States

New York

New York