Tea Bowl and Dish (c. 1784–95): Artwork and History

Tea Bowl and Dish (c. 1784–95) is in the Art Institute of Chicago collection. The museum lists its creator attribution as Artist unknown (Chinese, made for the American market) China.

The work and its context

The Art Institute of Chicago describes the work:

This tea bowl and dish, decorated with an American sailing vessel and the initials CWJER (or CW & ER), are among the many examples of souvenir ware that captains and trade merchants special ordered from the porcelain shops in Canton to commemorate their journeys. The decoration on these pieces is of a more personal character than the average stock porcelain. Motifs for commemorative ware were most often copied from illustrations on mercantile and cargo documentation and thus probably bore little resemblance to the actual vessels.

Object facts

• Title: Tea Bowl and Dish
• Date: c. 1784–95
• Artist attribution: Artist unknown (Chinese, made for the American market) China
• Place of origin: China
• Medium: Hard-paste porcelain, glaze, with enamels in colors, and gilding
• Dimensions: Cup: 4.5 × 8.6 cm (1 3/4 × 3 3/8 in.); Saucer: 3 × 14.1 cm (1 3/16 × 5 9/16 in.)
• Type: Ceramics
• Department: Arts of the Americas
• Reference number: 1958.222a-b

Collection credit

Bequest of Frederick S. Colburn

View the original

Explore the artwork in the Art Institute's collection, including its image and the museum's current catalogue details.

The description above is credited to the Art Institute of Chicago and reused under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0; HTML formatting has been converted to plain text. Other catalogue metadata and the public-domain image are provided under CC0 1.0.