Jingdezhen kilns
Bottle Decorated with Phoenix Motif
1332-1366
Physical Qualities
Porcelain with underglaze cobalt decoration, 11 1/4 × 6 1/2 in. (28.6 × 16.5 cm.)
Credit Line
Julius Levy Memorial Fund
Object Number
1959.45
Many vessels of this type featured popular Chinese motifs such as the dragon or phoenix combined with lotus leaves like those decorating the shoulder and lower body of this example. These bottles were among the earliest porcelains painted with blue designs exported from Jingdezhen's kilns. Naturally occuing iron in the cobalt pigment caused the black splotches. Improvements in refining the mineral eliminated such impurities.
The Baltimore Museum of Art by purchase, 1959; Howard C. Hollis, Cleveland
Collection installation, "Asia. Artistic Innovation & Exchange", Levy Gallery, Baltimore Museum of Art, October 5, 2023-
Frances Klapthor, Chinese Ceramics, Baltimore: BMA, 1993, no. 28, p. 40.
On View at the BMA
