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Lot Essay
'Hare's fur' tea bowls, much beloved by tea connoisseurs, were first made at the Jian kilns in Fujian in southern China. Following the Jin conquest of the north in 1127, such bowls became virtually unattainable as trade between northern and southern China diminished. Trying to tap into the lucrative market for these specialized dark-glazed wares, the Cizhou potters began to produce wares exhibiting their own version of this highly desirable glaze.
A slightly larger black-glazed bowl of similar shape with three russet splashes on the interior, now in the New Orleans Museum of Art, was sold at Sotheby Park Bernet, 23 October 1976, lot 206. A related black-glazed bowl in the Scheinman Collection with 'hare's fur' markings and three emphatic russet splashes, is illustrated by R. Mowry, Hare's Fur, Tortoiseshell, and Partridge Feathers, Harvard University Art Museums, Cambridge, 1996, p. 148, no. 42; the same bowl is illustrated by J. Kuo in Born of Earth and Fire, Baltimore, 1992, p. 82, no. 61, along with a black-glazed bowl, fig. 62, similar in shape to the Barron example but with a white rim.
A slightly larger black-glazed bowl of similar shape with three russet splashes on the interior, now in the New Orleans Museum of Art, was sold at Sotheby Park Bernet, 23 October 1976, lot 206. A related black-glazed bowl in the Scheinman Collection with 'hare's fur' markings and three emphatic russet splashes, is illustrated by R. Mowry, Hare's Fur, Tortoiseshell, and Partridge Feathers, Harvard University Art Museums, Cambridge, 1996, p. 148, no. 42; the same bowl is illustrated by J. Kuo in Born of Earth and Fire, Baltimore, 1992, p. 82, no. 61, along with a black-glazed bowl, fig. 62, similar in shape to the Barron example but with a white rim.