J.J. Lally & Co., Oriental Art / New York City, New York
MenuPast Exhibition
Chinese Ceramics A.D. 400–1400:
Selections from an American Collection
March 19 - 31, 2007
17.
A LARGE PAINTED CIZHOU POTTERY PILLOW
Northern Song Dynasty (A.D. 960-1127)
with wide concave cloud-shaped top raised on a high inset base of lobed columnar form decorated with a well drawn figure of a crane standing beside a rising lotus plant with large leaves painted in bold strokes of dark brown and with linear details freely incised through the brown pigment to the white ground, all within a brown and white line border on the upper surface of the rim above the neatly moulded down-turned lip, covered with a clear glaze showing areas of fine crackle and light staining, the underside and base covered with white slip and clear glaze, with some areas burnt darker and showing surface grit from the firing, the lower edge and bottom of the base left unglazed showing the pale gray stoneware.
Width 13 1⁄2 inches (34.3cm)
A large Cizhou pillow of this form decorated with a magpie on a branch in the same technique, in the Idemitsu Museum of Art, Tokyo, was shown at the Osaka Municipal Museum of Art and illustrated by Mino in the exhibition catalogue, Charm of Black & White Ware; Transition of Cizhou Type Wares, Osaka, 2002, no. 61, p. 91. Another large Cizhou pillow of this classic form decorated in the same technique with a peony bloom on a leafy sprig was shown at the Museum of Oriental Ceramics, Osaka and is illustrated in the exhibition catalogue, Chinese Ceramic Pillows from Yeung Wing Tak Collection, Osaka, 1984 , no. 51, p. 104.
Compare also the Cizhou pillow of this form, decorated with a phoenix and foliage incised through a brown ground, impressed with cartouches bearing inscriptions which may be translated “made by the Zhang family” and “the third year of Zhihe”, equivalent to A.D. 1056, illustrated by Scott, Percival David Foundation of Chinese Art, A Guide to the Collection, London, 1989, no. 35, p. 50.
