The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of August 13, 2022

Square Bottle with Squirrel and Grapes

late 1600s

Japan, Edo period

(1615-1868)

Porcelain with overglaze color enamel (possibly Hizen ware, Kakiemon type)

Overall: 21.8 x 8.3 cm (8 9/16 x 3 1/4 in.)

Severance and Greta Millikin Collection 1964.261

Location

not on view

Description

In the 1600s, Korean and Japanese elites could enjoy wine from Europe. In his 1636 travel diary called Haecharok, Kim Seryeom, a vice director of Korean envoys to Japan, recorded that the head of Japan’s Tsusima Island treated him to Western red wine. Therefore, export porcelain ware like Square Bottle with Squirrel and Grapes could have been made as a wine bottle.

Provenance
(John Sparks, Ltd., London); Severance and Greta Millikin, Cleveland, 1961
Citations
Cleveland Museum of Art, and Jenifer Neils. The World of Ceramics: Masterpieces from the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland: Museum in cooperation with Indiana University Press, 1982. Mentioned and reproduced: P. 157, no. 161
Cleveland Museum of Art, and Sŏn Sŭng-hye. The Lure of Painted Poetry: Japanese and Korean Art. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2011. Mentioned: P. 71; Reproduced: P. 75, no. 73
Exhibition history

Cleveland Museum of Art (8/30–10/15/1961): “Japanese Decorative Style”

Cleveland Museum of Art (7/5–9/2/1990): “The Severance and Greta Millikin Collection”

Cleveland Museum of Art, (3/27-8/28/2011); "The Lure of Painted Poetry" cat. no. 73

Japanese Decorative Style. The Cleveland Museum of Art (August 30-October 15, 1961); The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL (November 6-December 17, 1961).

The Severance and Greta Millikin Collection. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (July 5-September 2, 1990).

The Lure of Painted Poetry: Cross-cultural Text and Image in Korean and Japanese Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art (organizer) (April 15-August 21, 2011).

Source URL: https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1964.261