Jar

This Japanese stoneware jar, with a mottled gray glaze and drips of purple overflow, was one of the earliest Asian ceramics acquired by Freer. He bought it in 1892 from the New York-based Japanese dealer Tozo Takayanagi, from whom he had also purchased, in the same year, a Japanese painted fan. Freer subsequently turned to Yamanka and Company, another purveyor of Japanese art located on Fifth Avenue, for many of his ceramics purchases. In 1892, however, Tozo seemed to be enjoying a particularly good year. The periodical The Collector noted in its August issue: "Mr. Tozo Takayanagi announces the removal of his Art Rooms to 160 Fifth Avenue. His collection is now especially rich in the finest possible specimens of Japanese bronze, shakudo, porcelain and the like, most of them of an especially valuable decorative character" (see "Forecasts of the Fall Season," The Collector 3:18 (Aug. 15, 1892): 275).