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Figure of Guanyin
Made by: Ansbach Factory (Germany)
German
about 1720
Object Place: Germany
Medium/Technique
Tin-glazed earthenware (faience)
Dimensions
Height: 41.9 cm (16 1/2 in.)
Credit Line
Kiyi and Edward M. Pflueger Collection. Bequest of Edward M. Pflueger and Gift of Kiyi Powers Pflueger
Accession Number2006.938.2
CollectionsEurope
ClassificationsCeramics – Pottery – Earthenware
This piece epitomizes the tangled back-and-forth of the ceramics trade. The figure is the Chinese Buddhist deity Guanyin, but the piece was made in Germany, for the the European market. European factories often imitated Chinese forms, but the Chinese figurine of Guanyin that served as the model for this piece was actually an adaptation of a European Madonna that Christian missionaries had brought to China. Seventeenth-century Chinese potters had made Guanyin/Madonna figures for customers in Fujian province, and then exported them to Europe.
DescriptionAs the Virgin and Child, standing on grotesque animal mask, and decorated in cold colors in black, iron-red, yellow and gold
ProvenanceBy 1993, Edward M. Pflueger (b. 1905 - d. 1997) and Kiyi Powers Pflueger (b. 1915 - d. 2008), New York; 2006, bequest of Edward M. Pflueger and gift of Kiyi Powers Pflueger to the MFA. (Accession Date: April 26, 2006)