Indonesian Ceramic Shipwreck Vessel

Pale gray and fire-blackened on one flank, like a moon passing behind a cloud.

This shipwreck vessel is from Java Sea near Borneo, Indonesia, and dates to the 17th or 18th century. It is pottery. Wrecks such as the Turiang from about 1370, the Royal Nanhai from about 1460 and the Nanking cargo from about 1750 helped create shipwreck ceramics as a collecting category. Egg-shaped jar with a small flat-lipped mouth and a smooth ashy gray-white surface. A wide dark smoky patch covers one shoulder and spreads into soft orange edges, with fine lines circling the body. It is 12.5 inches wide, 12.5 deep, 15 high and 1.36 in diameter.

Half pale, half midnight, wholly composed.