Gu-Shaped Flower Vase (1893–97): Art, History and Details

Gu-Shaped Flower Vase (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:

Seifū Yohei III was the most prominent head of a ceramics studio in Kyoto that specialized in Chinese-style porcelains and especially items for use in sencha (煎茶), or the drinking of steeped-leaf tea with companions. Sencha was popular among the bunjin of Kyoto and Osaka, who often enjoyed it as part of their emulation of Chinese culture. While sencha was by design less formal than the Japanese tea ceremony, it still featured the display of treasured objects. Prized Chinese antiquities were generally unobtainable, so substitutes such as the Gu-Shaped Flower Vase were much in demand.

Object facts

• Title: Gu-Shaped Flower Vase
• Date: 1893–97
• Creator attribution: Seifū Yohei III (Japanese, 1851–1914)
• Culture: Japan, Meiji period (1868–1912)
• Type: Ceramic
• Technique: Glazed porcelain with molded and carved designs
• Dimensions: height: 31.1 cm (12 1/4 in.); Diameter of mouth: 13.5 cm (5 5/16 in.); Diameter of foot: 11 cm (4 5/16 in.)
• Collection: Japanese Art
• Department: Japanese Art
• Accession number: 2022.224

A detail from the museum

This gu-shaped vase has “cherry blossom glaze” (ōkayū), which Yohei III invented in 1890.

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.