Page 125 - China, 5000 years : innovation and transformation in the arts
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China is particularly rich in resources of earth, clay, Fig. 1. Bottle. Sui dynasty (581-618). High-fired white
and rock from which ceramics can be made. stoneware with translucent glaze; h. 21 cm. Hebci area.
Chinese ceramics vary immensely in quality but Meiyintang collection.
basically divide into two types: low-fired
earthenware (also called "pottery") and high-fired
stoneware and porcelain. Simple, rough earthenware
clay can be baked at low temperatures (up to about
iooo° C) to a modest, fairly soft, porous brown or
gray pottery. High-quality porcelain stone, when
fired at high temperatures (to about 1200° C), turns
into hard, dense, and usually gray stoneware; refined
and upgraded and fired at even higher temperatures
(to about 1350° C), it becomes a vitrified,
translucent, hard, and dense glass-like white
—matter which we call porcelain.
The fame of Chinese ceramics is built on these called porcelain are some sixth-century white wares
from the Northern Qi (550-77) or Sui (5S1-618)
latter high-fired wares. Porcelain stone, or china period (fig. 1). Between that period and the
thirteenth century (Yuan dynasty; 1279— 1368), a
stone, the raw material from which stoneware is great variety of more or less "porcelaneous"
made, is abundant in many areas of China, north stonewares was made throughout China, until in
and south. Very high quality porcelain stone can be the second half of the Yuan dynasty the continuous
used more or less as it is mined, without requiring production ot nothing but porcelains began at the
any additions or much preparation. Stonewares have kilns ofJingdezhen and China's stoneware tradition
been made in China since the Shang dynasty came to an end.'
(ca. 1600-ca. 1100 bce), and predate their Western
counterparts by over two and a half millennia.
The origin of porcelain is more difficult to specify, EAKTHENWAIIE IN THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD
for it was not an invention but an evolution from Only in prehistoric times was earthenware an
stoneware, an advance along the continuum of important material in China. The most practical
high-fired wares. Where one ends and the other
and versatile material available for vessels,
begins is a subjective decision. Distinguishing earthenware served essential functions in many
aspects of daily life. It was used throughout the vasl
characteristics are body composition and firing area that we call China, which, between the sixth
temperature. Since these cannot easily be and the second millennium net. was inhabited by
determined for ancient items, more superficial many independent and distinctive cultures. The
ceramics produced during the Neolithic period
features have to be taken into account, such as the (ca. 7000-ca. 2000 bci ) .ue as varied and complex
as the cultures themselves, but they do not vary
translucency and the whiteness of the body and the greatly in material and workmanship. I he red or
clarity of its sound when struck. The Chinese yellow pottery is often burnished and most
themselves do not distinguish at all between the frequently painted with abstract geometric designs
111 brownish black, tones ot red. ami while
—two high-fired materials stoneware and (cat. [13); more rarely it bears anthropomorphic,
—porcelain and use the same name (ci) for both, as
distinguished from low-fired earthenwares {tito).
The earliest nieces that id by inv rcckomii! b(
CERAMICS IN CHINA: MAKING TREASURES FROM EARTH 123
