Page 68 - Jindezhen Porcelain Production of the 19th C. by Ellen Huang, Univ. San Diego 2008

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collectors’ circles outside of China were Song Dynasty wares, which were seen as the

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“ideal beauty of form.” Influenced by the Arts and Crafts Movement, whereby the

values of purity of color and form reigned, Song Dynasty porcelains stood in direct

contrast with the colorfully ornate and lavishly decorated ceramics of the Ming and Qing

dynasty porcelains. Bernard Rackam drew the distinction by referring specifically to the

Guyuexuan wares – exactly the ones produced under Guo Baochang’s direction in

Jingdezhen – as exhibiting a “tendency to over-decoration and sometimes inharmonious

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colouring.”

Perhaps in contrast to the Western collectors’ penchant for simplicity over

decoration, Guo drew attention to the material - the interiority - of the porcelain bodies

rather than the glaze appearances. He explained the compositional raw materials in order

to differentiate between porcelain that was produced in kilns around Jingdezhen from

porcelain objects originating from other kiln sites, including Song-ware bodies, often

described as “coarse (cu ୑).” He clearly felt that the Jingdezhen kilns were the best and

“should the porcelain industry be revived, none other than Jingdezhen should be the

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center of the efforts” (chongzhen ciye, feicimoshu ye ࠠࣈନุ, ڢϤ୽᙮ɰ). Later,

he outlined the development of glazes, replicating contemporary understandings of the

development from monochrome glazes to multi-colored glaze decoration techniques,

again identifying the pinnacle of glaze production with Jingdezhen: “Jingdezhen kilns,

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since the Song dynasty, have produced every type of ware that came before.”
After giving an overview of glaze crackles and patterns, Guo then went on to

describe the kilns at Jingdezhen in a section of its own. As with an earlier writing on

Jingdezhen completed just before the fall of the Qing dynasty, the reigns of Kangxi,