Image of Gallery in South Kensington
On display at V&A South Kensington
Ceramics, Room 137, The Curtain Foundation Gallery

Incense-Holder

1740-1745 (made)
Artist/Maker
Place of origin

The range of enamel colours and style of decoration is very similar to a documentary basin, missing its matching ewer, in the San Lazzaro Armenian monastery in Venice. An inscription in Armenian/Turkish on the basin reads 'Öhannes, son of David', and includes a date in the Armenian calender of 1193 or Monday May 8th.1744

Yolande Crowe has linked the source of this type of exotic decoration to colourful contemporary Indian painted and printed cottons known as "chintz", made on the Coromandel coast.


Object details

Category
Object type
Materials and techniques
Fritware, polychrome painted, glazed
Brief description
Incense-holder, fritware, polychrome painted decoration in the Sivaz style, Turkey (Kütahya), 1740-45.
Physical description
Incense-holder, fritware, quatrefoil with large ornamental handle, painted in yellow, green, blue, red and purple with fine black outlines in the Sivaz style. Inside a seraphim is painted at the bottom and the lobed panes are divided at the top and bottom with zigzags, large flowers and serrated leaves. The exterior is also painted with large flowers and serrated leaves and the handle is painted with the head of an angel or seraphim, on the base is an elaborare cross.
Dimensions
  • Include handle length: 17.1cm
  • Height: 6cm
  • Width: 10.8cm
Style
Object history
From Sivas, Asia Minor.
Production
Label
Subjects depicted
Summary
The range of enamel colours and style of decoration is very similar to a documentary basin, missing its matching ewer, in the San Lazzaro Armenian monastery in Venice. An inscription in Armenian/Turkish on the basin reads 'Öhannes, son of David', and includes a date in the Armenian calender of 1193 or Monday May 8th.1744

Yolande Crowe has linked the source of this type of exotic decoration to colourful contemporary Indian painted and printed cottons known as "chintz", made on the Coromandel coast.
Bibliographic reference
The dated basin is published in Yolande Crowe, 'A Kütahya bowl with lid in the Walters Art Museum' in A Curator's Choice: Essays in Honor of Hiram W. Woodward, Jr., Journal of the Walters Art Museum', (2006-2007) Yolande Crowe, 'Kütahya and Caravans' in T.O.C.S.', (2008-9). For a discussion of incense holders, see Carswell, John & Dowsett CJF. Kütahya Tiles and Pottery from the Armenian Cathedral of St. James, Jerusalem , Vol. II. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1972. Appendix C, pp. 70-72, Fig. 27E.
Collection
Accession number
35-1892

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Record createdApril 9, 2009
Record URL
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