Physical Qualities
Pearlware, luster decoration
This ceramic dish is shaped like a pecten shell (though this shape is also commonly referred to as a scallop shell). It is colored with a pinkish/purple lustre, though there are areas where the color has presumably faded (in the “valleys” of the texture, which has ridges similar to the outer layer of an actual pecten/scallop shell., 1 x 9 1/8 in. (2.5 x 23.2 cm.)
Credit Line
Gift of Kenneth S. Battye, Baltimore
Object Number
2007.237
Ceramics were major cargo on the maritime trade routes of the 16th to 18th centuries, and potters through the 20th century capitalized on the intertwined relationship between ceramics and the ocean through decorative imagery. Ceramicists alluded to the sea by
molding real shells and creatures, creating water-like droplets of glaze, and painting or printing scenes of shores and shipbuilders in Europe and the Americas. The prevalence of oceanic imagery on domestic objects like plates, vases, and tureens also reveals the owner’s personal investment in colonial and maritime activities.
The Baltimore Museum of Art by gift, 2007; Kenneth S. Battye, Baltimore
Inscribed: None.
Markings: "SPODE" impressed on base
