Incense Burner (1893–1914): Art, History and Details

Incense Burner (1893–1914) 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:

Yohei III made incense burners in a wide variety of designs and styles. The body and glaze of this one are taihakuji, or “great white porcelain,” an important early invention Yohei III devised in 1872. The burner has rounded, cabriole legs, resembling tiny table legs, attached to the exterior and the faintest decorative band around the bottom. Lids were produced outside the studio by metalwork specialists. For this incense burner, they created a floral-patterned silver lid.

Object facts

• Title: Incense Burner
• Date: 1893–1914
• Creator attribution: Seifū Yohei III (Japanese, 1851–1914)
• Culture: Japan, Meiji period (1868–1912)
• Type: Ceramic
• Technique: Porcelain with creamy white glaze and molded design and floral openwork silver lid
• Dimensions: height with lid: 11.4 cm (4 1/2 in.); Diameter: 11 cm (4 5/16 in.)
• Collection: Japanese Art
• Department: Japanese Art
• Accession number: 2022.179

A detail from the museum

This cylindrical incense burner has a distinctive translucent, creamy glaze over an ivory-colored clay body.

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.