SOUTHERN SONG DYNASTY, 12TH-13TH CENTURY

细节

A RARE JIZHOU PAPER-CUT RESIST-DECORATED CONICAL BOWL
Southern Song dynasty, 12th-13th century
The interior of the shallow flared sides decorated in resist technique with a pattern of scattered plum blossoms reserved in dark brown glaze against the finely variegated buff matte ground thinning at the rim, the exterior covered with a dark brown glaze over a milky russet glaze ending in a line above the shallow foot to expose the buff ware covered in a thin wash burnt dark brick red in the firing
6in. (15.3cm.) diam., box

拍品专文

The Jizhou kilns in Jiangxi province were perhaps the most daring, versatile and technically creative kilns of the Song dynasty. Among the kiln's most innovative techniques was using paper stencils to create resist designs. For a discussion of the processes involved in producing designs using paper cut-outs, see R. Mowry, Hare's Fur, Tortoiseshell, and Partridge Feathers, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1996, pp. 36-7.

There is little doubt that this handsome bowl was used for drinking tea. Like Fujian, where large numbers of hare's fur-glazed bowls were produced, Jiangxi province was also an important tea-producing area, and the large number of tea bowls made at the Jizhou kilns, as well as those in Jian, reflect the increasing popularity of tea-drinking in China during the Song dynasty.

Bowls of this type are represented in many famous collections. A bowl of this design in the Avery Brundage Collection, Asian Art Museum of San Francisco, is illustrated by R. Mowry, op. cit., p. 250, no. 101. Another example is illustrated by J. Ayers in Chinese Ceramics in the Baur Collection, Geneva, vol. 1, p. 97, no. 51. Compare, also, the deeper bowl with similar decoration illustrated by R. Krahl in Chinese Ceramics from the Meiyintang Collection, vol. 1, London, 1994, p. 283, no. 525.