Accessorize your Asian decorated space with this fine example of the Song Dynasty style.
This vintage Song Dynasty "style" Cizhou-ware Chinese ceramic pillow in cat form with brush painted animals and craquelure glaze is in very good vintage condition with a glaze chip on the nose and on the bottom. It is handcrafted and painted, molded in cat form with decorative fierce facial features and Chinese characters. The back is decorated with a beast of burden and surrounding the piece are differing armaments of battle. On the reverse is a crouching Tiger. The hole in the cat's ear was used to fill the piece with warm water during cold winter months for comfort. During the hot summer months, the user filled the piece with cool water for ease of sleeping. Artist's signature present bewteen the eyebrows.
The piece has marks of the Museum of the American China Trade and American Heritage Museum Collection, an association first created in 1964. The American Heritage (AH) Museum Collection specialized in reproductions of antiques and decorative Items.
Dr. H. A. Crosby Forbes founded the Museum of the American China Trade and opened its doors in 1964. Forbes attended Harvard University for his undergraduate and graduate studies, and taught for a time at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Most importantly, he was inspired by the Forbes family history—with a total of eleven family members engaged in the American China Trade between 1789–1891—to pursue a long and successful career as a curator of Asian export art. He is the author of the book, Chinese Export Silver, which was published by the Museum of the American China Trade in 1975. Dr. Forbes also spent over two decades as curator of the Peabody Essex Museum, in Salem, Massachusetts.
In 1984 the Museum of the American China Trade became the Captain Robert Bennet Forbes House, and is now called the Forbes House Museum.
The Captain Robert Bennet Forbes House, also known as the R. B. Forbes House and Forbes House Museum (and formerly as the American China Trade Museum), is a house museum located at 215 Adams Street, Milton, Massachusetts. It is now a National Historic Landmark, and is open to the public.
Measures approximately 9" long and 5.5" high.