Bowl with Dragons Chasing Flaming Jewels (1893–97): Art, History and Details

Bowl with Dragons Chasing Flaming Jewels (1893–97) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Seifū Yohei III (Japanese, 1851–1914).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

The decoration of this large bowl, described as a donburi on one side of its box, is executed entirely in molded and carved relief under a creamy, pink-tinged translucent glaze. The main motif is a pair of four-clawed dragons pursuing flaming jewels. As is standard for this design, the beasts are surrounded by wisps of cloud, and a foliate pattern runs around the bottom of the basin. A geometric pattern circles the exterior of the footring. The white-on-white design makes the bowl subtle and elegant.

Object facts

• Title: Bowl with Dragons Chasing Flaming Jewels
• Date: 1893–97
• Creator attribution: Seifū Yohei III (Japanese, 1851–1914)
• Culture: Japan, Meiji period (1868–1912) to Taishō period (1912–26)
• Type: Ceramic
• Technique: Porcelain with molded and carved design
• Dimensions: 9.5 x 18.6 cm (3 3/4 x 7 5/16 in.)
• Collection: Japanese Art
• Department: Japanese Art
• Accession number: 2022.238

A detail from the museum

Kyoto-based Japanese ceramist Seifū Yohei III (1851–1914) admired the glaze colors found on Chinese porcelain and tried to replicate them through intensive experimentation.

Collection credit

Gift of James and Christine Heusinger

Further reading listed by the museum

• Maezaki, Shinya and Sinéad Vilbar. Colors of Kyoto: The Seifū Yohei Ceramic Studio. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 2023.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.