Three porcelain works from Make Hauser & Wirth Somerset's Objects of Contemplation — from Akiko Hirai's erupting moon jars to Olivia Walker's frilled, organism-like bowls — on what it means to hold still while seeming to move.

Start with a Ming dynasty jar and a single dragon commanding a white surface. Add two and a half centuries, a Dutch draftsman, and a butterfly that belongs to neither culture. What holds these objects together across three hundred years is not style but something more stubborn: the absolute conviction of cobalt on white.