Nothing wrong with this neck, though

(Or: if you can't get the neck right, remove it).

About 4 inches in diameter.

What I cannot photograph is the experience of holding one of these things in your hand: the bowls and their lids fit together perfectly; and they weigh -- nothing: the porcelain seems no thicker than an egg-shell and you get the impression that a merest breath would cause them to float away in the air. I saw them for the first time about a week before I could buy them; and during that whole week, every time I recalled holding them in my hand, a soft, warm feeling arose in my chest, like a steamed Chinese bun. And when I closed my eyes at night, I could see their zany colors float up before my eyes. What incredibly precise painting! And what an audatious move: purple dragons?! Only Qianlong could have dared to come up with that.

Paid for the two about a third of I paid for the mynah-vase, too. Peanuts. Not even a hundred bucks. A crap dinner for two with mediocre wine would cost more. I simply cannot believe it. Can you?

On picking one, or, why aesthetics should be taught in school

You know about the silk brocade wrapper, I suppose. Except... this one is yellow. And you know what that means, of course.














The quality of the painting is very impressive: note that this bird is about 5 cm long in the original!


But then you turn it over to see the seal and... no, it does not say "Made in the Qianlong reign of the Great Qing"! It says... Gugong -- which is to say, of course, The National Palace Museum.


These copies -- this one is of a very famous Qianlong piece dated to 1742 (see here) -- are mass produced now, somewhere on the Mainland -- I am told in Guangdong. But they are produced by traditional techniques and the level of technical attainment is really very high.

Picking the vase I wanted from among the seven that were available was an interesting exercise:

1. One was not stable -- something went wrong with the foot in the initial firing.

2. Another one I rejected because of its shape -- the gall-bladder shape is famously difficult to reproduce. This is important -- the potter must achieve seemless, shoulderless curvature as the body profile inflects from concave to convex around the neck and shoulder (which ought to be indistinguishable). This is very hard to do. The rejected piece looked decidedly shouldered, even square-shouldered, like a football player in armor, and therefore -- graceless. Even in this case, the shape is not perfect, but at best satisfactory. My vase is therefore not a true collector's item; it will neither appreciate in value nor even store it. But I could not have the best shaped vase -- which was as close to perfect as I have ever seen: its painting was awful; and I wanted to have one of these -- on my desk, now, and it had to be at least passable.

3. I rejected another vase because it had a firing flaw: a serious flaw, in fact: too large to be on display in the museum. The piece ought to have been destroyed at the workshop, not shipped out to ruin the potter's name.

4. I rejected another yet because it had a barely perceptible stain on the glaze -- someone handled it with dirty hands before second firing and fixed his fingerprint in eternity for us to admire.

5. And among the remaining three there were noticeable differences in the quality of painting. This painter pleased me especially with his fine, small-brush detail of bird feathers, even though his flowers were paler than on the other vases; nor was his tree bark as gratifyingly gnarly. But I figured: this genre of decoration -- huaniao -- flowers and birds -- requires well painted birds, right?

Back in the days of Qianlong, one vase -- or perhaps two -- would have been selected from among not seven but perhaps -- a thousand; and the rest of the production -- would have been destroyed. The resulting unsurpassed quality of the imperial pieces affects their price (in tens of millions of dollars these days, if you can ever find one) as much as the fact that they once belonged to The Main Man Himself.

*

A footnote is in order. "Mass produced" -- a word I used above -- is a funny word: it still takes many men and many man-hours to produce each bottle by hand... And the quality of the best pieces is hardly "mass" in any way. I should really be careful about what I say...

After all, the production run cannot be very large: all the porcelain people here confirm this: the production of these copies has moved to China, true, but that was not much of a loss because... -- and this is the point -- the market for them has disappeared. Modern Taiwanese middle class is no longer educated to appreciate the traditional arts. In fact, Taiwanese middle class, like the middle class everywhere else in the world, is no longer educated at all in terms of aesthetics. It is taught to be good doctors and engineers and brokers and mathematicians -- those things which advance the state's cause of ever-rising GDP; but in the matter of enjoyment of life's pleasures, the middle class is left to its own devices, abandoned by the education system, left languishing in the joyless darkness of ignorance. Absent most rudimentary guidelines, it is preyed upon by the purveyors of childish glitter and empty notoriety -- the sort of BS in art it would not accept from quack doctors or fake religious prophets.

Now, if, like me, you think that sex education is a good thing not only because it allows for family planning and disease control but also because it helps people experience more joy in their lives -- makes them happier, and therefore, presumably more productive and more law abiding -- then you must admit that there are good arguments for instating aesthetic education in school.

Speaking of Fen Cai

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The National Palace Museum has a very good copy of this. Four hundred bucks! Not the sort of money one meets walking around unattended in the street, but certainly a fantastic deal considering that the original, if it ever came to market, would likely fetch seven figures. You could use it as a spitoon, for instance.

All I ever needed to know I had learned years back

The stunning decorative porcelains from the Chianlung period show at the National Palace Museum (here) is a chance to a) see old friends, b) see their never before seen friends (who chill their heels in cool dark of the museum storage caverns), c) learn that some friends have twins (having been executed in pairs; sometimes quartets; the NPM has at least two of these, for instance), and above all d) learn that one may go round the world to see everything it has to offer and in the end decide that what he still likes best what he had liked in the beginning.



It is also a chance to learn, thanks to a great educational video -- part of the show -- the 12 step production process:

1. Throw the piece on wheel using wet clay. This produces a surprisingly rough-hewn, fat, lumpy object. In fact, it looks surprisingly like the sort of stuff your friends throw in their weekend pottery class.
2. Let it dry and then carve and grind it (yes!) into final shape. This is what produces the extra-fine, thin walls and elegant shapes. The connoisseur's expression "well potted" does not mean "well-thrown", it means well well carved!
3. Paint the reign mark on the foot of the object.
4. Apply white glaze. (Spray).
5. Let dry and load in the furnace.
6. Fire. (The glaze turns clear, leaving a shiny white body with a clear reign mark).
7. Draw the decor design using charcoal.
8. Apply color glaze and let dry. (The decor design remains visible through the partly transparent glaze).
9. Carve the dry color glaze. There are two options: 1. carve all the way through to the (previously fired) clear gaze underneath. This leaves flat areas which can be painted in later. These will be the roundels for landscape or figurative scenes; or the scrolling colored leaves and flowers. Or 2. carve half-deep. This leaves a fine, barely impressed, somewhat lighter in color barely perceptible pattern which looks like -- well, brocade. (Magnify the two purple objects beneath to see the pattern within the purple "background").
10. Fire to fix the color glaze.
11. Paint the decorative elements (color flowers, landscapes, figurative elements).
12. Fire again to fix the painted decorations.

(The high rates of breakage and failure at every step make flawless pieces literally unique).



Some objects are decorated without the scrolling brocade pattern.


Here is a pair of dishes, top (enamel painting on white glaze) and bottom (brocade pattern yellow with painted scrolling flowers).




The quality of the miniature painting on these pieces is stunning. Enlarge yourself:



Having seen so much pottery everywhere in the world, I remain helpless slave of the detail, technical mastery and rich color of Qing fencai pieces.

In which I am, I suppose, like Ibn Battuta of Tangier, who, having traveled half the world, returned home and for the next 30 years, until his dying day, never left the city of his birth again.

PS. The video and the objects used in its production (and now part of the display at the show) suggest that someone still commands this technique. This could be the Jia Yang Company, of Jing de Zhen, listed in the credits. It has no internet presence.

And new cups, plus a word on universal goodness

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The two mugs are thinly potted, well proportioned (both pretty to look at and well-shaped to limit heat-loss through surface evaporation), light-weight (easy to lift, don't take too much heat out of the tea), and they fit my hand perfectly (they are five-fingers-high and just the right width for my hand to wrap around comfortably). They take about 200 ml of tea, which is about the right serving for my body-size (and appetite). The fluted opening assures that the edge remains cool, allowing one to lift them (as one lifts Asian cups -- by the edge) without burning one's fingers.

The first one is matte. I have yet to research this type of glaze.



It's certainly very pretty: mildewed reeds in early autumn. This cup is especially pretty inside:



even though, personally, I prefer cups with white or light-colored glazing inside as they allow one to see the color of the tea. (This is not only pleasant, but also has the practical benefit of allowing one to judge whether the tea is strong enough).

The second cup is glossy-glazed. The outside glaze is called robin's egg: the glaze contains a mixture of two different salts which melt at slightly different temperatures and separate in the kiln, creating tiny, milkish runs in a dark-blue background.

This is not the best robin's egg I have seen, or even the best I own, but it is the best robin's egg I own on a cup which is comfortable to drink from. This glaze is famously difficult to fire: out of 10,000 cups perhaps 2 or 3 might be "perfect" (and command huge prices). Finding a piece which has both the right shape and a well-executed robin-egg is very difficult.






The inside is glazed in a different color: a kind of blond caramel. This, too, has run revealing finger marks on the inside of the cup (the cup was thrown on a wheel). They seem to me like the ribs of the great behemoth -- seen from inside the belly.



I like containers with a strong color contrast between inside and outside. And the caramel color is light enough to allow me to see the color of my tea.

I have declared these two cups to be a set: similar enough to be a set, yet different enough to be interesting. I like to mis-match my pottery this way: uniform sets testify to the aesthetic laziness of the host.

I'll serve you your tea in them when you come. By the side of my pond, of course (small ponds being, as you know, the perfect place to have tea, especially if there is a small wooden bridge nearby, or a small painted wooden boat; or so says a Chinese classic, the Chasu).

Here I have them all: the pond, the bridge, the boat, and the tea.

*

The Platonic question as to whether there are universal values has herein its answer: some cups are better than others. A cup must be not too large (or one can't finish the tea) and not too small (or one is kept busy rebrewing and refilling); it must be of a shape that fits one's hand well; and shape and thickness which won't cool the tea excessively; it should be white or light-colored inside to allow one to evaluate (and enjoy) the color of the tea.

Thus a goodness of an object can be shown to depend on the use to which it is put. It is very well for someone to say "I prefer that cup over this", but what if he is not a tea-drinker? Then, in a certain sense, his opinion is irrelevant and his cup is probably useless -- for tea.

Similarly with glazes: as one learns about the techniques and looks at different pieces executed in it one learns to recognize quality -- the difficulty of the piece and the excellence (or not) of its execution: a connoisseur is only as good as the sum total of everything he has seen. It's hard to say that a robin's egg is better than a celadon; but it is quite easy (and uncontroversial) to say that this robin's egg is better than that. And thus under certain circumstances one may well say that this robin's egg (a rare, well executed robin's egg) is better than that celadon (a badly executed celadon). In this sense it is true that quality is relative; but not in the sense in which the phrase is usually meant: there is nothing arbitrary about the goodness, only the initial conditions are. (E.g. shall we have a tea cup in robin's egg? If so, which one will do best?)

Thus it can be seen that there are true value judgments: they are true within a context. It's a little like the direction in which you point your car: north is the good direction if that is in fact where your destination lies. But if that is where your destination lies, no other direction will do.

Some new pottery on the table, too

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I read somewhere recently (I think it was in Tanizaki) that men who are too fond of ladies when they are young, generally turn into antique collectors when they are old.

"Tea-sets and paintings take the place of sex", the quote continued, rather coarsely.

Well.

Here's a plate in what is called "robin-egg" glaze, not terribly good, but coloristically very pleasing and a pleasure to eat off. Bright yellow omelets especially make for a nice color contrast.







And here is a large shallow serving bowl, sang-de-boef ("bull's blood", a paste-like deep brownish red) on the outside, buckwheat ("soba") glaze on the inside. Look up close at the glaze: it looks like it contains tiny flecks of gold.




This one is great for stir-fried greens, especially the bitter dark-green sorts.

Plate three bucks, bowl ten. Aesthetically speaking, my life is worth billions. I bet Warren Buffet does not get half the pleasure out of his Cherry Coke (registered trademark).

But, reluctantly, I am prepared to concede that Hari-Hara II (he of 20,000 wives) probably had more fun in his late forties.

More blatant voyerism

And how about this girl, eh.

Cup with curved rim and qingbai glaze, Northern Song, 11th century, Jiangxi, or perhaps Fanchang county, Anhui, height 7.3 cm.

The word used in the business for a perfect shape like this is "finely potted"; and she is: she shows off that which is best about Chinese porcelain (thanks to the world's best kaolin): it is very pliable when soft and extremely hard once fired, making it possible to produce very thin, fine shapes.


The catalog:

Qingbai wares were made over a fairly long period of time, from the early Northern Song period to the middle of the Yuan period. Their evolution follows a trajectory familiar for many types of wares: the earliest examples are finely made and take their inspiration from already popular wares made at other kilns (...); then there is a period of growing confidence, when the potters develop and perfect their styles -- the classical period; then attention turns to maximizing profit and methods of improving production, such as upside-down firing; and, finally, quality starts to drop off and an attempt is made to cover the deficiency with extravagant decoration and novelties.

Of course, art historians of Chinese pottery are interested in this trajectory model because its automatic application helps them "date" pieces (rather dubiously, I should think); but there is something convincing about it: it may seem to fit many other art forms -- consider the trajectory of Italian painting between 1400 and 1750. There are probably important psychological and economic reasons why this should be so; it bears thinking about, does it not.

But enough theorizing. Look here: the superiority of porcelain over plastic no longer lies in color and shine; but it still lies in the feel of things (porcelain is heavy, hard and cool); and -- in texture. If you look closely at the piece you can just make out (despite my bad photography) that the color of the qingbai glaze is not as smooth to the eye as its surface is smooth to touch. Rather, if you look very closely you will see that the color looks like curdled milk: with more or less uniform-sized fat bits of white swimming in a somewhat darker shade of white. (Click to enlarge).



In this, qingbai is like Lucknawi emrboidery: white on white. (You see a fellow in a shirt and it looks kind of crumpled, like he forgot to iron it. But then you look closer and -- oh my god -- it is covered with a field of tiny flowers!) There is a moment of wonderful surprise; and the pleasure of knowing that we have seen something most will never do.

Dancing pork bellies

I don't know who Francisco Capelo is, but the man sure has taste. Wow. Taste most commensurate with his (obviously) pretty ample financial firepower, too: the show of his Chinese pottery collection at the Madre de Deus (a.k.a. Museu Nacional de Azulejo)-- that would be Mister Tile Museum to you -- is a merciless progression of take-no-prisoners masterpieces.

Through this magical forest the (very) occasional French, German or Spanish tourist marches briskly with barely the time for an occasional snapshot.

I carried away 450 photos. Here are five.

This piece is a tripod censer with a purple-splashed jun-ware glaze, Jin or Yuan dynasty, ca. 13th century, 7.3 cm high. It is also a meibutsu, having once been owned by the Moris of Hiroshima.

Look at the detail of the crackle (and, as they say on porn websites, "click to enlarge yourself"):


The mouth is a kind of blunderbuss -- it's pure pornography, really -- :


And look at this lady's stubby feet jammed into the world's pointiest stilettos:

Would not these tiny trotters make the world's most delicious pie-de-cochon?

And do be my guest, go ahead, take a prurient peek (in the privacy of your cabin) at her incredibly erotic belly (no, love, please, never lose a gram of weight, do not, I repeat, do not change a thing):

*

Jun wares -- writes the catalog learnedly, if ungrammatically -- are among the most fascinating and controversial Chinese ceramics. Unlike most greenish- or bluish glazed wares, which rely for their color on mineral oxides, it turns out to be very difficult to understand how the typical thickly-bubbled Jun glaze generates its characteristic opalescent blue color. Current theory holds that it is generated by a phenomenon called "liquid-liquid phase separation" in which glasses in the glaze separate out within other glasses during cooling. When light strikes the glaze, it is scattered by the glass-like particles in the glaze and produces the same sort of effect as when light from the sun is scattered by the atmosphere and appears blue to our eyes.

There, fellows, the girl wears the sky for a dress.

*

The Francisco Capelo of the collection is probably not this Francisco Capelo, but I rather liked the idea that he might be: "Yeah," his collection set by side with his portfolio would be telling us, "I sell this stuff because I can -- God only knows why; and also because I just don't want to keep it around the house (I mean, would you?); then I use the proceeds to buy something of universal and eternal value whose quality I could not hope to match in a thousand years. For me, it is a win-win situation."

(In financial markets, this would be termed arbitrage).

Not really Qing, but pretty all the same

From the people who brought you the tobacco leaf reproductions, here is a mug in a style called Qing.




Not really Qing, but pretty all the same.

In the forest of porcelain

One of the wonderful images in this production of Stravinsky's Rossignol is a Forbidden City built of gigantic jars of porcelain. In the Gulbenkian there is a forest of gigantic jars of porcelain:



Wondering through it -- or rather circumambulating it -- one can snatch different glimpses of this jar:








It is about 2.5 ft tall and is decorated in exquisitely painted and flawlessly fired famille verte. The topic of the decoration are auspicious birds -- cranes, phoenixes, peacocks, hawks, etc. -- and each symbollizes a different virtue. I am guessing it was produced to celebrate an important anniversary of an important figure -- its recipient -- and was meant to suggest that he possessed all the virtues represented on the jar.