Covered dish 1831 - 1837

Curator: We’re looking at a covered dish created between 1831 and 1837 by Tucker and Hemphill, a Philadelphia-based ceramics manufacturer. It's now held at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Editor: It’s pristine. The overall impression is cool, serene, and almost… untouchable. There is an intense formality. The monochrome color, white, really enhances that feeling. Curator: Exactly. Porcelain tableware like this was incredibly aspirational in early 19th century America. It signals wealth and gentility but also reflects larger anxieties about social hierarchies at the time. Owning such items allowed people to perform and display a specific level of refinement and class. Editor: It's interesting how everyday objects become these stages for cultural performances. The pure whiteness makes me wonder, though—was this aesthetic choice tied to contemporary racial biases and notions of purity that underpinned the dominant culture? Curator: That’s a valid question to ask. While color was available at the time, a market for plain white ware existed; it spoke to a different aesthetic sense and referenced the costly white porcelains imported from Europe. Tucker and Hemphill aimed to compete directly with these imports and establish a distinct American identity within a specific decorative style. Editor: So, on the one hand, it represents a desire for a unique national identity. But it could be argued that this identity was also rooted in exclusion and inequality, especially considering the labour conditions inherent in its creation and the elite status associated with owning it. How do we reconcile those conflicting narratives? Curator: We confront them directly. Objects like these aren't just beautiful artifacts, they are complex symbols laden with social meaning. This covered dish prompts us to investigate not only artistry and taste, but the underlying societal structures they mirrored. Editor: That makes appreciating something like this more difficult, in some ways, but certainly richer. I find my understanding transformed from an aesthetic impression to an engagement with an uncomfortable legacy. Curator: Precisely, it's in these multilayered explorations that objects truly resonate with us, connecting us to both history and its echoes in our present.