Kenzan-style food bowl with design of pine trees
date: label: Date
content: mid 19th century
label: Period
content: Edo period
name: label: Artist
content: Style of Ogata Kenzan 尾形 乾山 (1663-1743)
label: Artist
content: Kyoto workshop, Kenzan style
notes: label: Description
content: Bowl (futujawan), missing lid, ovoidal; bold foot. Gold lacquer repairs.
label: Description
content: Clay: buff stoneware, fired in reduction.
label: Description
content: Glaze: transparent.
label: Description
content: Decoration: in cobalt and iron, with patch of white slip, under glaze.
label: Description
content: Signature: Kenzan, written in iron on foot.
label: Signatures
content: Kenzan, written in iron on foot.
label: Label
content: The earliest ceramics made by the Kyoto potter Ogata Kenzan are finely wrought works that echo the shapes and colors of contemporaneous luxury goods, including lacquer and albums of poetry illustrated with Japanese-style painting. Later in his career, Kenzan developed simplified versions of decoration that could be reproduced quickly and in quantity, responding to their immense popularity. As seen in the landscape with a pine grove on this bowl, the abbreviated “Kenzan style” of decoration became a staple of Kyoto ceramic workshops. The bowl originally had a matching lid and was one of a set of bowls used for serving steamed food.
label: Provenance
content: To 1899
label: Provenance
content: Bunkio Matsuki (1867-1940), Boston, to 1899 [1]
label: Provenance
content: From 1899 to 1919
label: Provenance
content: Charles Lang Freer (1854-1919), purchased from Bunkio Matsuki in 1899 [2]
label: Provenance
content: From 1920
label: Provenance
content: Freer Gallery of Art, gift of Charles Lang Freer in 1920 [3]
label: Provenance
content: Notes:
label: Provenance
content: [1] See Original Pottery List, L. 428, Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery Archives.
label: Provenance
content: [2] See note 1.
label: Provenance
content: [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.
label: Collection
content: Freer Gallery of Art Collection
label: Exhibition History
content: Parades: Freer Ceramics Installed by Gwyn Hanssen Pigott (November 4, 2006 to January 7, 2008)
label: Exhibition History
content: The Potter's Brush: The Kenzan Style in Japanese Ceramics (December 9, 2001 to October 27, 2002)
label: Previous custodian or owner
content: Bunkio Matsuki 松木文恭 (1867-1940) (C.L. Freer source)
label: Previous custodian or owner
content: Charles Lang Freer (1854-1919)
place: label: Origin
content: Kyoto, Kyoto prefecture, Japan
topic: label: Topic
content: ceramic
label: Topic
content: pine tree
label: Topic
content: Kyoto ware
label: Topic
content: Edo period (1615 - 1868)
label: Topic
content: tea
label: Topic
content: Japan
label: Topic
content: stoneware
label: Topic
content: Japanese Art
label: Topic
content: Charles Lang Freer collection
setName: label: Related Online Resources
content: Google Arts & Culture
label: See more items in
content: Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery Collection
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Gift of Charles Lang Freer
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery
identifier: label: Accession Number
content: F1899.36
objectType: label: Type
content: Vessel
objectRights: label: Restrictions & Rights
content: CC0
physicalDescription: label: Medium
content: Stoneware with white slip, iron and cobalt pigments under transparent glaze
label: Dimensions
content: H x Diam: 6.7 x 13.4 cm (2 5/8 x 5 1/4 in)
label: Style
content: Kyoto ware