Translated from Chinese, the work provides an overview of the history of Chinese pottery and porcelain and their place in other cultures. It also provides a list of important ancient kilns in China, arranged by name of kiln, location, dates, products and bibliography.
Chinese Pottery and Porcelain, by Li, Chih-yen and Ch’eng Wen
Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1984.
Chinese Export Porcelain in North America
Provides a historical survey of the history of collecting Chinese porcelain in North America, from the late-16th to the early-20th century. One chapter deals with the United States where the China trade began in late-18th century.
I think I would call this an introductory book on Chinese export porcelain. The perspective is the North American and I think if that is where you are, maybe this is the book to begin with. It is not a “master piece”, maybe it tries to cover too much, but I still think it is a good beginners book which covers most bases and illustrates some of the more serious collectors items that belongs to the North American history and tradition. If you just want one book on this topic, this could be a good choice.
New York: Clarkson N. Potter, 1986.
Oriental Blue and White, Sir Harry Garner
One of several old books on the subject I really like. It’s a time tested classic, originally published in 1954. Personally I think the third edition is the best. Garner is very “readable” even if later research has proved him not entirely correct in some details, but that will eventually happen to everybody, and does not detract from the overall understanding of the subject of Chinese porcelain that this book will bring.
It is a splendid classic and belongs in any serious reference library, but just that it does not need to come in there first, it should some day, but there is maybe no need to buy this book as one of your first.
Hardcover: 104 pages
Publisher: Faber and Faber
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0571047025
ISBN-13: 978-0571047024
Classic introduction to Chinese Blue and White porcelain, mostly Ming. If you started to collect Chinese porcelain a few decades ago, this was on of the books you would find useful as an introduction to this exclusive passtime.
The Chinese Potter, by Margaret Medley, London, 1976. The publisher tells “Most studies of Chinese art deal with types, period or styles, but this historical examination of Chinese ceramics, which uses recent research, explains how the evolution of pottery depended upon the technological developments of the Chinese culture. The book’s practical approach makes full use of archaeological reports to show how differing geographical areas, materials and developing technology all shaped the evolution of Chinese ceramics.” Now, this is today a somewhat outdated book but the author is a good writer and with her excellent grasp of the subject, this book will not be too old to read for a very long time to come.
The work provides a very useful overview of Chinese ceramics, the technology, formation and development, varieties and forms.
China has the longest and most highly developed ceramic tradition in the world, encompassing early Neolithic earthenwares, the finely glazed stoneware pieces of the Song period – widely regarded as among the greatest ceramics ever produced – and the years of Imperial patronage and export ware for the new markets of the West. Margaret Medley’s groundbreaking study was the first to bring a practical approach to the study of Chinese pottery. She makes full use of archaeological reports to show how differing geographical areas, materials and developing technology all shaped the evolution of Chinese ceramics. Her revolutionary insights, along with an astute critical judgment in the field of art history itself, combine to form a classic but approachable account which has profoundly influenced the way in which Chinese pottery is studied.
1st ed. published in 1976
2nd ed. Oxford, U. K.: Phaidon, 1980.
3rd Revised edition issued in 1989, ISBN: 071482593X
A handbook of Chinese ceramics
Covers ceramics from the Neolithic period to the present. This is a good “summary” and draws on pieces from the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The illustrations are good and the text concise and on the dot. There is something as too much, when it comes to information and this is “enough” in most cases. It is a good buy if you are looking into just one book. I like it because I can trust the information, and the selection of pieces is a good one. Does this sound like you have heard it before? Well, they are very similar but there are much more pictures in this then in Vainiker. The outlook is mostly technical.
The 2nd ed. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1989 is a partially rewritten and much enlarged edition, the work includes an index, more illustrations and new information from recent archaeological discoveries. It provides a description of the Metropolitan Museum’s collection, but also gives a history of Chinese ceramics.
CHINESE POTTERY AND PORCELAIN: FROM PREHISTORY TO THE PRESENT
Covers ceramics from the Neolithic period to the present. This is a good “summary” and draws on pieces from the British Museum. The illustrations are good and the text consise and on the dot. There is something as too much, when it comes to information and this is “enough” in most cases. It is a good buy if you are looking into just one bok. I like it because I can trust the information, and the selection of illustration is good. It is actually hard to find just a few pieces that fairly well represent a whole period. The point of view is more humanistic than Valenstein’s (MET) book which is also a very good choice but which tends to do a lot of listings. I know, buy both. (LEFT: Second edition, 2005)
The publisher adds the following:
The art of Chinese ceramics encompasses prehistoric clay figurines of pregnant women, bronze ritualistic bells, exotic earthenware figures of merchants in the Central Asian silk trade, Ming writing-boxes bearing Arabic inscriptions, Taoist shrines adorned with lacquer and gilding, and pagoda tiles molded with monster masks. It’s an art as richly varied as Chinese civilization itself, as this resplendently illustrated survey makes abundantly clear.
Vainker, a curator at the British Museum, draws on the museum’s vast collection of Chinese stoneware, porcelain and religious sculpture in her absorbing narrative. Proceeding from the riotous gaiety of Tang “three-color wares” (A.D. 618-906) to the classical equilibrium of 12th-century Song pottery to a modern, softly glowing “eggshell” porcelain vase, Vainker vibrantly charts “a continued transformation of the contemporary into the collectible.”
Well this is not entirely the full truth. The author actually uses up close to 140 out of a total 216 (240 with appendixes) pages to approach actual porcelain and not before p 134 do we enter the world of blue and white porcelain. Still this is a splendid book which I highly recommended. (RIGHT: First edition, 1991.)
Chinese Ceramics, by He Li: A New Comprehensive Survey: From the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco.
If your interest is wider than ceramics, there is an old classic by William Willets, Foundations of Chinese Art (London 1965), I warmly recommend too even if it has a few years on its neck. It is by and large a product of Swedish contribution to the field and it reflecs very much of the Swedish I would call solemn view of old China.
CLASSIC – best starting point – must have
The Chinese Potter
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