D2528. Blue and White Bowl

Delft, circa 1690
The interior decorated with a central medallion depicting a horse surrounded by scrolling foliage and floral motifs, the slightly flaring rim with a band of floral scrollwork, repeated on the exterior rim above a blue ground reserved with floral motifs and large roundels with cranes and flowers the cavetto.

DIMENSIONS
Height: 12.7 cm. (5 in.);
Diameter 30.2 cm. (11.9 in.)

PROVENANCE
The Collection of Mark and Marjorie Allen, U.S.A.

NOTE
Large bowls are significantly less common in Dutch Delftware than in English Delft, likely due to the differing drinking customs of the two nations. While taverns and pubs were popular venues for consuming alcohol in both Holland and Britain, on the Continent – particularly in the Netherlands and Germany – earthenware, stoneware, and metal tankards were more commonly used for drinking. In contrast, in England, punch bowls often served as the central vessel for spirituous beverages, with their contents ladled into glasses. By the mid-eighteenth century, smaller punch bowls were sometimes passed directly among drinkers. Despite their association with celebratory drinks, bowls have a wide variety of practical uses.

Historical Delft price lists indicate that bowls with plain or fluted sides were introduced in various sizes, with the largest referred to as kastkom or “cupboard bowls.” These were primarily decorative items, designed to be displayed on the tops of cupboards or cabinets, as evidenced by their depiction in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century genre and still-life paintings, as well as period written records.

Large Dutch Delftware bowls are rare, partly due to their low survival rate. The inherent tension in the clay body, resulting from the process of being thrown on a potter’s wheel, made these bowls particularly prone to cracking and damage. Once broken, even if repaired, they became unusable for practical purposes and were relegated to a decorative role.

SIMILAR EXAMPLES
A smaller bowl featuring chinoiserie decoration, marked for Lambertus van Eenhoorn, who owned De Metaale Pot from 1691 to 1721, measures 16 cm. (6.3 in.) in diameter and is housed in the Rijksmuseum collection (inv. no. BK-KOG-244). Additionally, a fragment of the bottom of a chinoiserie-decorated bowl from the same period, also marked LVE, is in a private collection.