J. F. Blacker

“ With the Chinese, the porcelain manufacture was a matter of custom, almost of religion. The gift of a piece of porcelain marked every solemn ceremony—the new year, the birthday, the marriage never passed without the presentation of a cup or vase which bore an inscription or a symbol of good wishes, or a character meaning either longevity or earthly happiness. Indeed, the visitor to the Chinese home could see not only cups and vases, but teapots, dishes, and plates with varied decoration and brilliant colouring, each telling its own story. ”

“ Yeiraku's skill was often tested by orders to copy all sorts of Chinese, Korean, and even Dutch pieces, which he did so well that the original and its imitation could not be distinguished. Yeiraku was wealthy now, and could have gone into easy retirement. Yet such was his love of his art that he worked on. He had produced the purple, yellow, turquoise, green, and the blue and white, also the coral red and enamelled porcelains of China, but he tried fruitlessly to get the tin glaze of Delft and the various glazes of lakes of the Chinese. ”

“ Incidentally one point will lead on to another, but with always this object in view, to send the collector to the museums to train his eye as well as his understanding and to bring him in touch with all that makes for beauty in Oriental porcelain, a porcelain teaming with mythology, having decorations saturated with that mythology, full of emblems of all that concerns the best and highest life of the Chinese, pointing, we may say, to a religion which, although feebly understood in Europe, has been for centuries a real moving factor in the national life of the Oriental peoples. ”

“ This is a very interesting decoration. The surface of the water is represented by the numerous short horizontal lines. In the water, the lotus, the sweet-flag, and other water-loving plants are growing, just as if the artist had made his drawing from the banks of an actual pond in the open air. Besides being beautiful, the lotus is the sacred flower of Buddha. Its large tulip-like flowers may be white or tinted pink, blue or yellow, and they hang over broad leaves, in shape like the nasturtium leaf. It does not lie upon the water like the water-lily, but stands up from it upon a strong stem. ”

“ For instance, in the British Museum, Oriental Section, in the centre of a large cabinet, there is a small bottle-shaped vase which is a real "sang de bœuf," a glaze of a brilliant colour shaded towards a deeper claret and the base shading away into a pale yellow, pink towards the lip, which retains the soft, natural tone of the body or paste. Then just below the neck the "sang de bœuf" seems to glow with the intensity of the ruby, just before it falls from the shoulder of the piece towards the base. ”

“ The peach blossom, the lotus, the dragon of the Emperors or of the princes appear side by side with the kylin, the Korean lion or dog of Fô, the sacred Ho-Ho birds, or Fong-Hoang, &c. On the plates and dishes specimens of the Oriental flowers were spread out in all the glory of vivid colour—peonies and chrysanthemums, lotus and azalea, with insects and butterflies no less gorgeous and certainly no less emblematical. Other specimens had for decoration rocks and trees with birds of rich plumage, and fishes with scales of golden hue. ”

“ Ninsei and Kinkozan have been mentioned as celebrated potters, Kenzan and Yeiraku must be added to them. Kenzan at first imitated the Ninsei ware of Kyoto, but, being himself an artist and a brother of the celebrated painter Ogato Korin, he soon developed an original and genuine Japanese style in which striking results were produced with a seeming absence of laboured detail. The simplicity of a branch of prunus blossoms, a few nodding reeds or grasses, a little group of birds amidst the foliage, the distant hill seen through the midst, suited the space available for decoration. ”

“ Blue was one of the highly esteemed colours as well as one of the earliest. We have dealt with blue as an under-glaze decoration. It was not alone used for decorative purposes in drawings of figures, birds, animals, foliage, and landscape, but it was used in various forms as a body colour either on the biscuit itself, before glazing, for with the glaze as a self-colour, as a Celadon, in fact—that is, the blue was applied in the glaze or in the enamel. ”

“ Each branch, each leaf, has its value in the scheme of ornamentation. The surface is well covered, but there is no overcrowding. The Vase is of exquisite proportions, decorated on pure white glaze with a bold design of Ho-Ho birds, the plumage of rouge de fer, green, yellow, and aubergine; one bird is partly hidden by rocks drawn in various greens, aubergine, and blue, whilst springing from the back are large flowering branches of the peony flowers and blossoms. The drawing throughout is of the highest merit. The flowers and boughs are shown in yellow, blue, aubergine, creamy white, and black. ”

“ Again, we find little bottles decorated with dragons and symbolical dogs of Fô or Buddha cut deeply into the paste with a patience and an art unequalled in the productions of the Western Hemisphere. The statuettes of the gods and goddesses are also made in this white porcelain, amongst whom is one to whom we have before referred, Kwan-Yin, a mysterious being, the personification of mercy and goodness, who protects the sailors and saves them from shipwreck, who takes pity on those who suffer in hell and intercedes for them. She also gives children to those who are sterile. ”

“ Kwan-Yin has many attributes and emblems. Sometimes she has a diadem on her head ornamented with images of Buddha, or she rests seated on a throne of lotus in memory of the miraculous bridge which the gods constructed to enable her to cross the sea. The god of riches is often found as a white statuette, so is Poutai, the god of contentment, with a broad smile and round, uncovered stomach; Cheou, or Chow, the god of longevity, with an enormous bald head. Other figures of emperors and empresses are all of the same type, with the accompanying Ho-Ho birds. ”

“ The collector is able to see how he has tried to reconcile and combine the elements of a complete history of Oriental china, how he has collected specimens of all the manufactures, even the smallest, how Oriental porcelain holds the first place in the collection, being represented by most remarkable specimens of industry which in the Celestial Empire to-day is on the decline, after having had a brilliant career through so many ages, that it seemed as if nothing could have led to its failure. ”

“ There is no proof that any blue and white Oriental china, except during the most recent times, was ever decorated on a transfer-printed ground. All of the blue and white Nankin and Canton ware was painted by hand under the glaze. When we consider the immense amount of labour necessary to keep up the supply of porcelain to Europe, and also to the United States early in the nineteenth century, it is astonishing that no process work showing transfer printing can be discovered, although the invention must have spread to China before 1796 when Keen-lung died. ”

“ Confucianism orders respect and veneration for ancestors, who ought to be cherished and treated as if they were living, so that the ancestral worship was an incessant witness of gratitude and thanks, which has become the only real religion of the followers of Confucius in China. ”

“ Not only in decoration, on vases, and other pieces, are these gods depicted either singly, in pairs, or all in one group, but also in single figures and as a group of figures. Sometimes eight, and sometimes nine are found in one group, the ninth being Lao Tsze himself, the founder of Taoism. Many of these figures, as in the illustrations, are very beautiful in colour, and so entirely quaint and curious in modelling, often with faces and hands, in white biscuit, and so rare. ”

“ The hare (Chinese tu, Japanese usagi) is sacred to the moon, where the Taoists believe it to live, pounding the drugs that form the elixir of life. It is stated to live one thousand years, and to become white when it has reached the first five hundred years. The hare, often miscalled a rabbit, occurs on porcelain, both as a decoration and as a mark.
The stork (Chinese ho, Japanese tsuru) is one of the commonest emblems of longevity. It is said to reach a fabulous age, and when six hundred years old to drink, but no longer eat; after two thousand years to turn black. It occurs as a mark. ”

“ The crackle porcelain is a distinct class, though it will be found that many of the pieces having a single glaze are also crackled. They are covered with a clay or enamel which having been burnt in the kiln is taken out and subjected to the action of a current of cold air, or they are dipped in cold water, so that by unequal contraction cracks are formed with a regularity which, although in the first place accidental, became, in the skilful hands of the Chinese, science. Small crackles like the herring's roe, and large crackles like the ice cracks, could be produced by the potter as he chose. ”

“ The Keen-lung class of blue and red under the glaze was derived from that discovered in the Yung-ching period. Its application was developed with surprising skill by the finest workmen, so that the application of copper red under the glaze, in combination with blue, gave splendid opportunities for these artists to display their pre-eminent skill for freehand drawing in applying designs upon the biscuit porcelain before the glazing took place. If, for example, you pass your hand over a piece decorated under the glaze, you will find a surface perfectly smooth, the colour has sunk into the paste. ”

“ We call them china or porcelain vases, &c., and in that we are only following the Chinese usage, though the colour glaze is often so thick as to hide the material or body of the paste altogether. The thickness prevents any transmission of light; they have an opaque more or less coarse clay white or red body, and amongst our English products would be classified as stoneware. But the colour is the thing, and here we shall repeat ourselves a little, because it is necessary to really understand not alone what the colours are, but generally the order of their invention. ”

“ The third eye, which is seen in the centre of the forehead, is supposed to represent the faculty possessed by this deity of seeing more than any other person or god, for with the aid of this third eye he was able to see not only what took place externally, but to read into the innermost depths of a man's soul, as well as the past, present, and future. The figure is supported on a rectangular stand, the front of which is decorated with a bold diaper design in aubergine, yellow, and black, on a pale green ground, whilst in the corners are Joo-e heads in yellow, green, and aubergine. ”

“ The surface must be a brilliant white when covered by the glaze. The drawing and painting should reveal the best qualities of cobalt blue. The shape of the piece must leave nothing to be required. Now, it is well known that blue and white was, and is, the most common of all Oriental porcelain, and modern work is good, so that it becomes quite easy to make mistakes; in fact, it would not be too much to say that old blue and white is most difficult to judge. Though the glaze is so much a part of the paste that it lasts practically for ever, yet it does get slightly dulled ”

“ Showy, brilliant, and decorative reproductions are met with frequently, but neither in paste or painting are they comparable. Real old Satsuma, at first sight, looks like ivory, and the designs display infinite care, the colours being low in tone, whilst the gold is pencilled with such a multitude of minute lines as to be truly wonderful. ”

“ Indeed, though the European influence exerted by the Jesuits may possibly have been more powerful than before, yet no European china quite reaches the glowing brilliance of these Chinese vases and dishes. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, and Chelsea tried to copy the rose colour, the result being the fine claret colour of the Chelsea china. ”

“ SYMBOLICAL MARKS AND ORNAMENTS
"Every picture tells its story" is true when applied to Oriental decoration where history and mythology furnish many of the designs, and almost every flower and colour has its own meaning. On the porcelain many of these devices are used either as marks or ornaments; sometimes they have ribbons or fillets entwined around them, and they vary considerably in style and shape. Those given are from Sir A. W. Franks's book, "The Catalogue of the Franks' Collection of Oriental Porcelain and Pottery," exhibited at the Bethnal Green Museum. ”

“ Both paste and glaze are hard, and although some people speak of soft-paste Oriental porcelain our observation teaches us that it is so rare that it may be neglected by the ordinary collector, who, if he should accidentally find a piece, will remember that this soft paste is of a very white colour with an opaque look, and for painting under the glaze seemed to have the disadvantage that the colours were more liable to run than on the ordinary description, which is just like what has been found on early English soft-paste porcelain, where the colours are liable to run upon the paste. ”

“ Although the Chinese potters had at their command an endless list of gods, goddesses, saints, and devils in their mythology, they appear to have loved to draw and to model the eight immortals, Kwan-Yin, Si-Wang-Mu, and other Taoist divinities, to the exclusion of all except a few Buddhist gods. This seems to be due to their intense desire for a long life as the highest good. Constant use is found for the character Show, which is written in a hundred different ways, as shown in the robes of Kwan-Yin and Si-Wang-Mu in the illustrations of those goddesses. ”

“ In China the carp and perch are often found in the decoration of small reserves. Indeed, the immortals are often drawn standing upon a fish, and modelled as figures standing on fishes, crabs, or crawfish. The effects of fish culture as carried on by the Chinese is very marked in the case of the carp, which are often seen with monster-like projecting eyes and tufted or lobed tails. They are kept in garden ponds or in large jars in which are placed rocks covered with moss and water-plants, which furnish the decoration in the illustration. ”

“ Amongst the trellis many Chinese characters are to be found, such as the emblem of longevity, the mark called Cheou, Chow, or Show. We shall have more to say of reticulated porcelain later on, but here we may mention that the reticulation on the outer wall is often elaborate, and the cover glazes give a variety of colours equal to that found upon ordinary china. The whole white porcelain family, whether we consider the beautiful creamy ivory ware, or the dead white, or the blue tinged white, is rarely marked, and when a mark is used generally it is a seal character moulded or cut in the paste. ”

“ Although Confucianism may be said to be the official religion of the Court, of the functionaries, and of the learned, it is not a religion in the sense which we attach to the word. Confucius was the reformer of the ancient national religion, which was really fetishism. It is a code of practical morality based upon the duties and obligations of mankind, and respect for both ancestors and antiquity. Idols such as images of gods and spirits are put on one side. Confucius recognised implicitly the existence of a God creator of the world—Chang-ti, the Emperor Supreme, or Thien, the Heaven ”

“ No training is as good as the handling of fine old pieces, in which the grain of the porcelain, the colours of both the porcelain and the decoration can be studied, and the knowledge thus gained becomes the experience which is, above everything else, the necessary equipment to any one who collects old china.
The Chinese write in characters, each represents a word, and the commencement is made from the top of the right-hand side. ”