Iron in the Fire: The Chinese Potters’ Exploration of Iron Oxide Glazes
Iron in the Fire: the Chinese Potter’s Exploration of Iron Oxide Glazes: An Exhibition Held at the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford.
The 1988 exhibition and the catalog provide technical information on the wide range of iron-based colors found on Ming and Qing porcelains. This is a very good book with beautiful illustration of a number of very good and important pieces. I also find it quite interesting to see the variations of color that could be accomplished by one metallic colorant oxide – iron. As usual the people at Percival David Foundation felt we should know this and as usual, they are right.
Hard to find.
London: The Oriental Ceramic Society, 1988.
Paperback: 88 pages
Publisher: Ashmolean Museum Publications (January 1, 1988)
ISBN-10: 0903421232
ISBN-13: 978-0903421232
Canberra: Australian National University Press, 1983.
Organized geographically by provinces, the guide provides information on pottery in these provinces, with informative descriptions and illustrations.
Chinese Copper Red Wares (Percival David Foundation of Chinese Art monograph series ; no. 3), edited by Rosemary E. Scott.
Scholarly and scientific studies on Chinese copper red ware, its evolution and development, the micro structure and the glaze.
London: The Foundation, 1992.
Celadon Blues
This is a quite interesting author in the field of ancient Chinese pottery and porcelain since he is not an arts historian but a potter. I first noticed him through a book he wrote on a visit he once did to Jingdezhen, just to study Chinese pottery. Now that is dedication. This is another book by him I just figured I wanted to mention to the real hardcore Song pottery collectors, because here Robert Tichane sets out to recreate all these famous glazes – and if you skip the instructions on how to actually do that, the book itself really explains what distinguishes the famous glazes like Celadon, Jun, Yue, Temmuko etc. and how a really successful copy could look like. If you happen to be a potter, this is probably even more interesting. I however found it this book quite interesting if not of vital importance.
Chinese Glazes: Their Origins, Chemistry and Recreation
Chinese Glazes. Nigel Wood, London, 1999. This is an important book. If you are aiming at a “collection” of Chinese porcelain and really want to know this subject, this is definitely a must together with the He Li book above. If you are planning to buy 10 books on Chinese porcelain, this should be one of them. It is also highly recommended for those interested in Song Dynasty ceramics since glazes was very important during that period and, because I think Nigel is sorting out the fundamentals for that period in a very understandable way.
This book is also something of a “dictionary” since it is a very good book for looking up things in.
CLASSIC – absolutely necessary for understanding glazes. Also good as a Chinese Ceramics dictionary. Relevant and well researched.
Recent Comments