Page 241 - Chinese pottery and porcelain : an account of the potter's art in China from primitive times to the present day
P. 241
CHAPTER X
k'ang hsi polychrome porcelains
BROADLY speaking, the polychrome porcelams of the Ming
and K'ang Hsi periods are the same in principle, though
they differ widely in style and execution. The general types
continued, and the first to be considered is that in which all the
colours are fired in the high temperature of the large kiln, com-
prising underglaze blue and underglaze red, and certain slips and
coloured glazes. Conspicuous among the last is a pale golden brown
commonly known as Nanking yellow, which is found in narrow
bands or in broad washes, dividing or surrounding blue designs, and
is specially common on the bottles, sprinklers, gourd-shaped vases,
and small jars exported to Europe in the last half of the seven-
teenth century. The golden brown also darkens into coffee brown,
and in some cases it alternates in bands with buff crackle and pale
celadon green.
A deep olive brown glaze is sometimes found as a background
for ornament in moulded reliefs which are touched with underglaze
Ablue and red. fine vase of this type is in the Salting Collec-
tion, and a good example was given by Mr. Andrew Burman
to the British Museum. Both seem to be designed after bronze
models.
But the central colour of this group is undoubtedly the under-
glaze red. Derived from copper it is closely akin to the red of the
chi hung glaze, and both were conspicuous on the Hsiian Te porcelain,
both fell into disuse in the later Ming periods, and both were revived
in the reign of K'ang Hsi.
I have seen two examples of this colour in combination with
underglaze blue bearing the hall mark chung-ho-Vang, and cyclical
dates corresponding to 1671 and 1672 respectively. In neither
of these pieces, however, was the red very successful, and probably
the better K'ang Hsi specimens belong to a later period of the reign.
It was, however, always a difficult colour to fire, and examples
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