Rare Japanese porcelain coffee fountain circa 1700

Rare Japanese porcelain coffee fountain with a mercury-gilt bronze mount.

The jar-shaped fountain is topped with its lid, and the whole features a beautiful underglaze cobalt blue decoration on a white background depicting traditional scenes set against a backdrop of peony branches and rocky mounds.
A rich, finely chiseled and gilded bronze mount adorns the porcelain. It includes a base supported by three dolphins, three taps topped with figures blowing sea horns, and two rims for the body and lid.

Very well preserved.

The porcelain, Japan, Edo period, Saga Province, Arita kilns, circa 1680-1690.

The frame, United Provinces, Amsterdam or The Hague workshops, circa 1700.

Dimensions:

Height: 47 cm

Our fountain, which was created by repurposing an Arita porcelain jar, is unique to our knowledge, but other models using Japanese ceramics are preserved in museums such as:

- Lorient East India Company Museum. Featured on the poster for the exhibition "Coffee, Pleasure with a Bitter Taste," which ran from April 130 to December 15, 2022.

- Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (Inv. No. 79.2.176a)

- Ashmolean Museum, Oxford (Inv. No. EA1978.1090)

- Christie's, Paris, May 1, 2016, Lot 529

- Christie's, London, July 7, 2016, Lot 57

Our opinion:

The coffee fountain we are presenting is one of the very first delivered to Europe at the end of the 17th century, at a time when coffee was first appearing on the tables of princely courts.
It kept the drink warm on a small stove, and then allowed everyone to serve themselves as they wished. The coffee trade, which was then the almost exclusive preserve of the Dutch East India Company, was enjoying considerable success, particularly due to its properties considered aphrodisiac.
The coffee ceremony became a ritual at the end of a meal, but also began to punctuate mornings and afternoon teas, where it competed with tea and chocolate.
This moment of conviviality was also a time when the coffee maker displayed its wealth and power by offering a society elite not only a very expensive exotic beverage but also rare porcelain and oriental lacquerware, which were little known in Europe.
Porcelain was highly sought after at the time, for its ability to retain heat and its easy cleaning, but also and above all for its visual appeal and preciousness.
In the 17th century, it was considered a magical material, derived from the expertise of oriental alchemists who inspired the European nobility. The East India Company capitalized on this success by marketing the rare commodity of coffee, as well as all related utensils, since it was the only company authorized to trade with Japan since the country's closure and exclusion of the Portuguese in the mid-century.
The Land of the Rising Sun was the sole supplier of porcelain and lacquerware at this time, as China was barely emerging from the turmoil resulting from the fall of the Ming dynasty in 1644.
The East India Company then asked Japanese workshops to imitate Ming productions, which resulted in the Sino-Japanese style, with characters drawn in a primitive manner on porcelain whose shapes were still very much influenced by local productions. The precious porcelains were transported from the port of Kyoto in the company's ships to warehouses in Amsterdam or The Hague, where they were mounted in bronze by goldsmiths from the province of Augsburg. They were then marketed directly by the company through its stores or by specialized dealers located in major capitals.
This mastery of the entire chain, from production in Asia to marketing in Europe, enabled the famous "VOOC" to become the largest company in the world, both in terms of wealth and the number of ships and employees.
Few of these primitive fountains dating from the 17th century have survived; today, most of them are housed in the greatest international museums.
Our three-tap model is quite exceptional.