Celebrating Asian Art

Mary and Cheney Cowles Collection of Chinese Ceramics

March 16-24
The Mary and Cheney Cowles Collection of Chinese Ceramics has been quietly and judiciously assembled over the last fifty years, purchased from many of the world’s finest dealers and auctions, with an eye for artistic beauty and excellent quality. Several of the works have illustrious early 20 th century provenance, including Cunliffe, Hellner, Bernat, Falk, Yamanaka, Eskenazi, and Lally.

The fifty-six pieces offered span one thousand years from the 4th through 14th centuries, and include concentrations in white and sancai Tang Dynasty earthen wares, as well as Yue, Yaozhou, Ding, Qingbai, Jun, and Cizhou type wares, with black and brown kilns from Northern and Southern China represented.

Some standout examples include a large and intact Yue-yao storage jar, a Jun-yao brush washer from the Hellner Collection, an rare carved Yaozhou yuhuchun-ping, a large carved Qingbai lidded meiping, and a tigress and cub shaped Cizhou pillow from the Cunliffe Collection.

Although their ceramics collection was known only to a handful of visiting scholars over the years, and rarely seen in its entirety, Mary and Cheney Cowles have been generous benefactors to several museums in the United States, culminating in important donations of Japanese paintings to the Freer Sackler and Metropolitan Museums in recent years.