In 1206, Genghis Khan established the Mongol Khanate, and in 1271, Kublai Khan took the meaning of "Dazha Qianyuan" in the I Ching, changed the name of the country to "Dayuan", and unified the whole country in 1279. After the Tang Dynasty celadon "Southern Qingbei White", the five official kilns of the Song Dynasty and the ten major folk kilns competed for the odd and fierce research, and in the Yuan Dynasty, the most important role in the history of Chinese ceramics - Yuan Qinghua was a shining debut.
A large number of popular firing blue and white porcelain is painted under the glaze. It is a transparent glaze painted on the white embryo with cobalt material, and the white blue flower porcelain is burned at a high temperature in the reduced atmosphere, which is quiet and lovely, and the elegance is appreciated. The specific time of firing in Jingdezhen, Jiangxi is around 1330, prosperity in 1350, and prevalent at the end of the Yuan Dynasty in 1368. The specific location of Yuan Qinghua firing is in Hutian, Luomaqiao, Daijialong, Zhushan area, along the Silk Road exported overseas, its great charm lies in the decorative style has distinct Central Plains cultural characteristics, while dissolved into the grassland culture and Persian culture imprint, is a kind of art that can arouse the deep resonance of the soul of people all over the world, is a cross-regional, time-space, practical and ritual, religion and art integration, is one of the essence of human civilization in the world. A few days ago, the author had the opportunity to visit the National Museum of Iran, and I can better understand and appreciate the art of Yuan Qinghua.
▌ National Museum of Iran
The National Museum of Iran is located in Tehran, and its collection of yuan qinghua is the second best preserved collection in the world. Formerly known as the Adbir Mosque, it was dedicated to the court collection of King Abbas the Great of Iran in 1611. Overseas Collection of Yuan Dynasty blue and white flowers, mainly distributed in Europe, the Americas and Asia's major museums, the number of exquisite types are 58 in Europe, 41 in the Americas, and 168 in Asia. According to the overseas trade routes of the Yuan Dynasty, it was distributed in South Asia, East Asia, Southeast Asia, West Asia, North Africa and East Africa. The 28 pieces of yuan qinghua collected in Iran reflect the fusion of Mongolian culture, Islamic culture, Buddhist culture and Han culture in terms of vessel type, decoration, ornamentation and painting production process. The Yuan Dynasty ended the long-term coexistence of many small countries, the territory spanned the Eurasian continent, the territory was unprecedentedly vast, the Yuan Empire attached great importance to overseas trade, and blue and white porcelain came into being in this context. The Yuan and Ming dynasties have carried out 4 times, the cumulative time of nearly 15 years of large-scale sea ban, until the end of the second year of Yingzong to the end of the reign of 132 AD, the restoration of Quanzhou, Qingyuan (Ningbo), Guangzhou ports, with the continuous strengthening of domestic and foreign diplomatic relations and frequent trade exchanges, blue and white porcelain expanded the market, Zheng He went to the West, Zheng He's ancestors are Islamic families, his father and grandfather have gone to Mecca on a pilgrimage, have a deep understanding of the Islamic world, silk and ceramics sold in the Silk Road Economic Belt in exchange for rare treasures, Metalware from the West with diverse shapes also had a profound impact on the Blue and White Porcelain of the Ming Dynasty, and the policy of opening up after the internationalization of ceramics has made the East continue to learn from and absorb the fresh culture of the outside, and Chinese paintings have encountered foreign patterns, gradually giving birth to more excellent and more novel aesthetic perspectives and artistic interests, and constantly creating more excellent and richer ceramic decoration techniques.
▌ Yuanqinghua tangle peony with lid plum vase Collection of the National Museum of Iran
Overseas meta-blue flowers are mainly concentrated in Iran, Turkey, Britain, the United States, Russia, Japan, Syria, Italy, France, the Netherlands, Switzerland and other countries, and the excavated meta-blue flowers are mainly west Asia, East Asia, Southeast Asia, South Asia, North Africa and East Africa. Overseas exports are mainly through two forms of sea and land transport, mainly by sea, the scope of maritime transport east to Japan, west to Iran, arabian peninsula, Red Sea region, Syria, East Africa and North Africa, south to Southeast Asia and South Asia land, west through Gansu, Mongolia, Xinjiang to East Asia and Iran and other places.
▌ Maritime Silk Road
If you pay a little attention to the history of religion, Islam was introduced to China from the Tang Dynasty, from the Song Dynasty to the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, called Islam, and changed to Halalism in the middle period. A large number of Muslims from West Asia and Central Asia came to China in the Yuan Dynasty, including many captives during the Western Expedition, and the Arabs and Persians of the Tang Dynasty jointly formed the ancestors of the Hui people in China. The art of any era implies the beliefs and backgrounds of this era, which is the external expression of people's ideology, and the decorative art of ceramics is the same, and almost every decorative content on the yuan blue and white porcelain is related to Tibetan Buddhism, such as the miscellaneous treasure ornaments commonly found in Tibetan Buddhist paintings, which promotes the spread of Islam. Looking at today's modeling and decoration, such as the stupa with the lid, and the lotus petal pattern widely selected by religious symbols, it has been used as the main component factor of yuan blue and white porcelain.
The Mongolian people living in the steppe have a special preference for blue and white colors, blue symbolizes heaven and white symbolizes goodness, these two colors are the colors of the Mongolian origin totem "wolf white deer". It is only natural that the monochromatic vessel that the Han people have ever admired has been changed to blue and white blue and white porcelain to show the noble and magnificent imperial courage of the Mongol rulers. The Yuan Dynasty government paid more attention to trade, and the Maritime Silk Road caravans carried a large number of trade materials, starting from the coastal ports in southeast China, passing through the South China Sea, the Persian Gulf, and the Red Sea, and transporting the materials to Asia, Africa, Europe, and other countries in exchange for local specialties such as ore fur, which introduced the imported cobalt material of the low-manganese high-speed rail, which made the decorative arts of Yuan Qinghua have a qualitative improvement. Istanbul is an important city on the Silk Road, China and Europe, West Asia exchange goods are in this turnover, but also such an opportunity, so that the princes and nobles there have a better chance to get close to the charm of yuan blue and white porcelain, after the great love, the dishes of this type of utensils survive more, not only as a collection, most of the royal family use of dining utensils, tableware, with blue and white plates to replace gold and silverware.
▌ Yuan blue flower glaze red lotus chrysanthemum pine pattern carved beast button lid jar Collection of the National Museum of Iran
We still look at it according to the classification of ceramic appreciation: in terms of vessel type, the Mongolian and ancient West Asian peoples have a lot in common, such as the vessels carried by the nomadic people immediately, resulting in the small utensils of Yuan Qinghua with more ears tied, so that it is easy to bundle and carry, flat utensils are also adapted to the needs of production, wine utensils and other edible utensils are also more. At the same time, the Persians spread out in Syria and the Arabian desert, which is the basis for the formation of large pots, large plates, goblets, cups, flat pots and other utensils. Persia is the name of ancient Iran, the word is the meaning of rider, hunter, the Nomadic concept of West Asian peoples has a great influence on their art and has a great influence, and the way of eating and drinking in the daily life of the people sitting on the ground also has many inconsistencies with the Mongols.
▌ Yuan Qinghua Manchi Jiaotu Linghua mouth fold along the plate Private collection
On the glaze pattern, the yuan blue and white porcelain is quiet and blue, and the atmosphere is exquisite. In terms of color system, white ground black flowers have developed into white ground blue flowers. There are not only the feelings of traditional Chinese culture, but also the tone of common Islamic culture, common beads, treasure flowers, Western geometric patterns, Hu dances, Arabic characters, as well as the same generation of Egypt, Persia, Syria, the Middle East ornate ornaments, that is, the so-called "Persian Three Colors". However, unlike the domestic Jiangxi Gao'an Yuan Qinghua, the Silk Road Yuan Qinghua decoration is more elaborate and compact, and Gao Qi is fine. In terms of ornamental characteristics, according to the Mongolian, Islamic nation thriving at the same time, Yuanqingyuan Qinghua is also inevitably grafted with Han cultural elements, from the theme ornamentation, Yuanqinghua's theme ornamentation is mostly Chinese traditional ornamentation, such as peony, bunch lotus, lotus petal and change lotus pattern, dragon phoenix, qilin, pine bamboo plum, etc., of which, the painting method of the pine bamboo plum pattern is quite influenced by yuan dynasty painting, from the auxiliary ornamentation, ripples, wave patterns, echo patterns, banana leaf patterns appear in the decoration of Chinese yuanqinghua.
In terms of decorative style, there are two views on the flourishing style of nature: First, according to Islamic teachings, space is the place where demons appear, and they should be filled with dense ornaments to stop the activities of demons, obeying the will of God. Secondly, Western Islamic artists mention in Islamic decoration that the layout of the city and the congested living conditions make the local residents think that such a situation is the embodiment of social harmony, while the empty wilderness is a hidden threat to the places where beasts and enemies are infested, so the blank place is considered to be unsafe.
The Bedouin people who live in the desert all year round, because of the continuous nomadic life, make the personality of the people here have a bold and tenacious temperament, and at the same time produce a compensatory thinking in the desert environment, just as the scene of heaven described in the Qur'an: "The flowers are blooming, the warblers are chirping, the rivers are clear, and the eyes are full of green cages." Artistically, it shows the philosophical realm of unity with Chinese heaven and man. It also contributed to the emergence of this new and rich art form, which has created so many wonderful decorative styles to this day. This gene is deeply trapped in some normative, timeless plot of abstract geometric patterns or plant patterns, in the strange and exaggerated staggered shapes of Arabesques and Arabic ligatures, in the epitaphs of the great monarchs and in the maxims on the gables of mosques. The origin and formation of Islamic art and then perfected, are derived from the rise of Islam, so the artistic ideas and prevention that run through it cannot deviate from the rituals and norms of religion, the Qur'an warns the people not to paint portraits, gods and animal sculptures, etc. In the Sunnah, Prophet Muhammad once said that if you want to paint, Allah will punish you, unless you can give life to the figure on this painting. You can't do that, then you can only be punished, and if you have to paint, you can paint trees and other lifeless things. A blue and white ornament from the Victoria and Albert Museum in england contains the words of the Quran in the diamond-shaped opening light: "All mosques are Allah, so you should pray for Allah, do not pray for anything..."
▌ Zhengde blue and white diamond-shaped open light palindromic interstitial screen
Collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum, UK
In the kiln site and firing technology, Yuan Qinghua's porcelain making technology is also affected by Cizhou kiln, Jizhou kiln, Jingdezhen kiln, Yuxi kiln, Longquan kiln, Yuan Dynasty it does not have a real sense of the official kiln, but also "there is a fate to supply, no life is stopped", the folk kiln is also lifeless, in Jingdezhen, Jiangxi, Yunnan Jianshui kiln and Yuxi kiln, has continued until the end of the Yuan and the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, the reason why Yuan Qinghua can be successfully fired, such as the firing underglaze technology of the Jizhou kiln, the technology is easy to spread. Yuanqinghua porcelain blue and white glaze to improve the Song Dynasty blue and white glaze formula, mainly white glaze calcium oxide content is less, sodium and potassium content increased, in the process of high temperature, the glaze dissolution rate is stronger, the tire of iron oxide dissolved and affect the whiteness of the glaze, so as to produce porcelain suitable for blue and white glaze, while the alumina content increases, so that the glaze of the utensils to reach the indicators of hard porcelain, and then improve the firing temperature at the same time, impurities are also burned away, porcelain tire tire quality is whiter, conducive to painting, avoiding other kiln mouth tire color dull, Apply makeup soil to paint the embarrassment.
In terms of production and dissemination, small pieces of yuanqinghua utensils, such as small pots, vials, and small pots, are sold to the Philippines. At present, the shape and ornamentation of the small jar of folded branches and chrysanthemums unearthed in the Philippines are exactly the same as those of the Hutian kiln, and the large pots, small pots, plates, and bowls of the excavated utensils are all export porcelain, concentrated in the Topkapir Museum in Istanbul, the capital of Turkey, and the yuanqinghua of the temple in Tehran, Iran, which are brightly emitted and beautifully painted. The clerics of the Temple of Aldbier did not regard these blue flowers as treasures at first, and in the early 80s of the last century, due to the Cultural Revolution, the concept was not clear, and at the beginning of Sir David's collection, until the American Pope and the British scholar Hobson, they had studied and identified these porcelains, separated a large number of yuan blue flowers and flowers, and disclosed them. As a result, as the meeting point of Europe, Asia and Africa, and also the end of the Silk Road, the astonishing number of Chinese porcelain collected in the palaces of Iran and Turkey has come to light.
▌ Yuanqinghua symmetrical flower and leaf pattern fold along the large plate Private collection
In summary, in the process of conquest of Eurasia, the Yuan Great Khan Empire plundered a large number of people, they usually separated the craftsmen, "sent to the East", and killed all the rest, which shows the importance that the Yuan rulers attached to the craftsmanship. Persians and Arabs, who embraced Islam, entered and stayed in China's coastal cities, dating back at least to the Tang Dynasty. These Muslims who entered China, most of them began as soldiers and craftsmen, and later "lived in their essence and devoted themselves to the anointing", such as the craftsmen in Hangzhou, Jews. In the early days of Mongolia, there was almost no handicraft industry to speak of, and the conquest of Central Asia, so that they not only had exquisite crafts, but also had excellent Hui craftsmen, their aesthetic feelings became the persian Iranian civilization linked, relying on the government to set up imitations, relying on Hui craftsmen to produce a large number of traditional products of the Islamic world, and the Yuan Qinghua on the Silk Road came into being.
"The face is wonderful, and the light shines in all directions." Immersed in a huge cultural context, Yuan Qinghua is not only an object for people to use in their daily lives, but also a carrier that is infused with human thoughts, emotions and social culture in a specific history. Through jingdezhen and Persian ceramic art, is a major turning point in the history of the development of Chinese ceramic art history, it is not only the result of its own development and evolution, but also the result of the joint action of various systems of culture, if the Persian ceramics as part of the development of world ceramics, promote the development of world ceramics, the significance of civilization exchanges will gradually recover, brilliant and shining, forever in history!