On loan to The Met The Met accepts temporary loans of art both for short-term exhibitions and for long-term display in its galleries.

Daoist ritual cauldron

China

On view at The Met Fifth Avenue in Gallery 215

This cauldron and the nearby vessel (LCB.217) evoke archaic bronze shapes but replace ancient motifs with Daoist patterns, including the eight trigrams encircling the rim, arrays of bosses representing constellations on the body, and symbols of the sun and moon on the handles. The marks on their bases indicate that they were once owned by the same individual—Tianyi Shanren, likely a Daoist priest—and used for making elixir, a Daoism specialty in pursuit of immortality.
Mark
天一山人丹鼎
Elixir cauldron of Mountain Man Heaven One [Tianyi Shanren]

Daoist ritual cauldron, Copper alloy, China

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Daoist ritual cauldron, Copper alloy, China
Daoist ritual cauldron, Copper alloy, China
Daoist ritual cauldron, Copper alloy, China
Daoist ritual cauldron, Copper alloy, China

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