The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of December 13, 2025

Teacup from Tea Set with Chinese Landscape

c. 1893–1914

Seifū Yohei III

(Japanese, 1851–1914)
Japan, Meiji period (1868–1912)
Porcelain with underglaze blue
5 x 8.2 cm (1 15/16 x 3 1/4 in.)
Gift of James and Christine Heusinger 2022.171.7
Location: Not on view

Did You Know?

A fourth cup shows a humbly dressed man with a broad-brimmed hat lugging a package tied to the end of a rod slung over his shoulder. In front of him is a two-story building flanked by deciduous trees and a man resting against the side of a sturdy stone bridge as he looks at a residence, or perhaps a set of roofed gates, further up the path.

Description

The theme of this sencha tea set is the Chinese scholar-recluse in an idyllic landscape. Each of the five teacups has a landscape with an architectural structure and some human activity.

This tea set has a side-handled pot called a kyūsu, used for steeping, straining, and serving tea. Unlike some others, this set also has a yuzamashi, a container used to cool boiled water to just the right temperature for the best flavor when steeping. Seifū Yohei III’s painting teacher, Tanomura Chokunyū (1814–1907), made a visual record of famous sencha events that shows how these kinds of porcelains fit with objects such as a stove and kettle to form a complete set of utensils for tea preparation, and with ensembles of decorative objects meant to inspire creativity
  • ?–2022
    James and Christine Heusinger, Berea, OH, given to the Cleveland Museum of Art
    2022–
    The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
  • Vilbar, Sinead. "Colors of Kyoto: Modern ceramics of Japan.” Cleveland Art: Cleveland Museum of Art Members Magazine 63, no. 2 (2023): 14–17. Reproduced and Mentioned: p. 14 archive.org
    Maezaki, Shinya and Sinéad Vilbar. Colors of Kyoto: The Seifū Yohei Ceramic Studio. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 2023. Mentioned and Reproduced: cat. no. 27, pp. 100–101
    Goodall, Hollis. "Seifū Yohei III: Master of Finesse." Impressions: The Journal of the Japanese Art Society of America 45, part 2 (2024): 178-193. Mentioned: p. 186; Reproduced: p. 187, fig. 5
  • Colors of Kyoto: The Seifū Yohei Ceramic Studio. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (August 19, 2023-March 10, 2024).
  • {{cite web|title=Teacup from Tea Set with Chinese Landscape|url=false|author=Seifū Yohei III|year=c. 1893–1914|access-date=13 December 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/2022.171.7