The Ming and Qing Dynasty royal buildings are mainly represented by yellow tile red walls, and the picture shows the palace wall of the Forbidden City in Beijing (Photo: Zhang Lin)
The concept of Chinese red is deeply rooted in the hearts of the people. Especially on the occasion of the Spring Festival, when every household buys new clothes and flowers, food packaging, ornaments and other New Year's festival supplies, it is inevitable to choose red. Taking the good omen of the auspicious and prosperous New Year is a cultural tradition that has existed in China since ancient times.
In ancient China, color had its own unique theoretical system, and the five elements theory corresponded to the attributes of the Five Colors of China, which affected the social environment, from the ruling class to the common people, from architectural design to clothing and utensils, all of which were not subject to its regulations. Moreover, successive dynasties and dynasties have their own "popular colors", which are not static. The representative color of China, red, as we recognize it today, was loved by the ancient ruling class from the beginning of the Ming Dynasty and flourished in the Qing Dynasty. The remnant halls of the Ming Palace in Nanjing, the Ming Tombs, the Imperial Palace in Shenyang and the Forbidden City in Beijing are mainly represented by yellow tile red walls, and at that time, folk families also use red for weddings, children and other happy events to show their joy and gradually become customs. Until the Qing Palace, at important moments such as seeing the Son of Heaven, celebrating birthdays, and new spring festivals, women often wear red jewelry, and the house also prefers to display red utensils, which show auspicious blessings. For thousands of years, red artifacts that have been popular with people of ancient and modern times include porcelain, lacquerware, coral products and so on.
Qing Jiaqing red satin flat gold lock embroidered Fulu Shou character purse, the Collection of the Palace Museum
Various colors of red porcelain: an exploration of the purest to the right red glaze
Porcelain developed from pottery, and primitive porcelain appeared very early, but the firing was rough. When the national strength of the Tang Dynasty flourished, there were two major porcelain-making systems in Zhejiang Yue kiln and Hebei Xing kiln, known as "Southern Qing and Northern White". After the Tang Dynasty, the manufacture of porcelain was gradually valued by the rulers, and official kilns and folk kilns appeared one after another. To some extent, the level of porcelain-making technology represents the productivity level of the dynasty, and the patterns and characters painted on the porcelain also reflect the artistic creation style of the time, which can be described as the embodiment of the combination of culture and technology. Therefore, although the creation of porcelain color styles is limited by technical means, it is also heavily influenced by official preferences.
The fame of the five famous kilns of the Song Dynasty probably stems from the "Xuande Ding Yi Genealogy" written by Lü Zhen in the Ming Dynasty, which was used by Zhu Yuanzhang to summon the scholars of the Hanlin Academy to formulate a ceremonial system and determine the style of the new dynasty's sacrificial vessels, and the opening volume mentions: "The wood, ru, official, brother, jun, and named kiln utensils hidden in the inner library are elegant, and the drawings are presented." Among them, the wood kiln belongs to the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period, not to mention; Ru kiln, official kiln, Ge kiln, Ding kiln are rich in celadon and white porcelain, which is very consistent with the humanistic and artistic style of the time, and is mainly simple and elegant. However, although the Jun kiln located in Yuzhou City, Henan Province also produces celadon porcelain, there is a case of "Jun Red" color, which has created a new realm. Its liquid enamel flows downwards when roasted at high temperatures, but does not decolor. Because the glaze configuration is not fine enough, mixed with other metal oxides, creating a purple tone of jun red, for people who do not pursue pure monochrome, it has a vivid charm. Junhong is not as good as the red weizheng is flamboyant, and it is not like the crimson delicate and gentle, and the thickness of its glaze texture slows down the brightness of the rose color, so that the porcelain as a whole reveals the jump in the implication, and hides the warmth in the gentleness, giving people a sense of solemnity and pleasure. At that time, the Yongzheng Emperor of the Qing Dynasty also imitated the variable glazed porcelain of the Jun kiln in order to seek the natural flow of glaze.
The British Museum houses jun kiln porcelain
The Jun kiln is a small step attempt to fire red porcelain, and the Jingdezhen kiln took a big step in exploration in the Yuan Dynasty. Yuan Dynasty porcelain production with Jingdezhen as the prosperity, basically with blue and white as the direction of production iteration of the kiln, but there is no lack of small-scale attempts at red glaze - perhaps from a momentary burst of inspiration, perhaps from the failure of successive generations of craftsmen, the long creation of red glaze porcelain, it began. The Yuan Dynasty red glaze dark engraved cloud dragon pattern pot now stored in the Palace Museum is from the Jingdezhen kiln, the pear-shaped pot body, straight mouth and round abdomen, should be the newly created shape of Jingdezhen. The whole body is covered with red glaze, and the abdomen is secretly engraved with a five-clawed cloud dragon pattern with a thin neck and long mouth, and the most rare thing is that the glaze is uniform and the glaze is brightly colored. Don't look at this small holding pot, it is already a treasure in the red glaze ware of the Yuan Dynasty that has been handed down to this day. Porcelain with red glaze throughout was rare in the Yuan Dynasty, but the technique of glaze red became a unique creation created in the Yuan Dynasty. The process of early glaze red was to apply a thin layer of blue and white glaze as the base glaze on the embryo, then paint with color materials, and finally use a layer of blue and white glaze as a cover glaze and burn it into the kiln. Because the pigment is between the bottom glaze and the cover glaze, the copper red liquid is easy to volatilize at high temperatures, so the porcelain glaze after the kiln often has a kind of ink falling and dying effect. Excavated in Wuzhong District, Suzhou, the glazed red white cloud dragon pattern lid jar is a classic artifact in the glazed red porcelain of the Yuan Dynasty, and its abdomen is placed on the glaze on the blue and white background to lightly engrave the two plates of the dragon, which are plated on the body, and the outer contour of the dragon pattern is glazed red, using the decorative technique of plucking white, making the white dragon look like a meandering rise between the bright red clouds. The dynamic drawing and the contrast of colors, the two dragons are still imposing, making the picture fascinating, showing the ingenuity of the Jingdezhen kiln craftsmen. In the later period, the process of glaze red in some kilns was changed to paint the color material directly on the tire, and a blue and white cover glaze was applied, which was "underglaze red", which was different from glaze red.
After red became the color officially recognized by the Ming Dynasty and widely used, it was used in the dignified and solemn court wall, used for exquisite and elegant concubine jewelry, used for the decoration of the old and the new year, and various porcelain kilns were constantly exploring, trying to burn a pure and authentic red porcelain. In fact, the reason why there has been no pure red porcelain before, in addition to the fact that red is not admired by the ruler in life, the more critical is the obstacle of process technology. The traditional red glaze uses copper as a coloring agent, but the stability of copper in high temperature environment is extremely low, and its color development is affected by many factors such as the reducing atmosphere, and it is very difficult to fire. Under the fine number, the copper red glaze glaze of the Changsha kiln in the Tang Dynasty has yellow, the Song Dynasty Jun porcelain is red with purple, the Jin Dynasty fired red and green color porcelain, and the Jingdezhen kiln in the Yuan Dynasty makes more glaze red. The whole body color is shiny and shiny, such as the high-temperature red glaze of ruby, which is known as "a treasure of a thousand kilns". And this thousand kilns and one treasure were once very popular during the Xuande years of the Ming Dynasty.
As mentioned above, Zhu Yuanzhang said that the empress dowager ordered Hanlin scholars to formulate a ceremonial system and determine the style of sacrifice vessels in the new dynasty. During the Xuande period of the Ming Dynasty, the bright red glaze was used as a sacrificial vessel in many years, and it was also called sacrifice red by posterity. The successful firing of bright red glaze is undoubtedly a major breakthrough in the exploration of red glaze, compared with jun red, the bright red glaze color is soft and stable, no longer has the feeling of flowing glaze; compared with the red color of the glaze, its whole body is one color, bright red and gorgeous, which is the purest and most authentic color pursued by the craftsmen of the past dynasties. Nevertheless, successful firing does not mean that the process is perfectly mature, and the bright red glaze is still extremely harsh on the firing conditions and the yield rate is extremely low. Moreover, in order to formulate this color that can be relatively reduced by the degree of environmental impact, the ancients spared no expense to feed precious jewelry such as coral, agate, jade, and red gold, so the bright red glaze was more expensive. Wang Shimao, a jinshi during the Jiajing period of the Ming Dynasty, described in his book "Peeping into the Heavens and The Outer Ride": "Our dynasty set up JingdeZhen in Fuliang County, and the burning of Yongle and Xuandejian Inner Houses has been expensive so far. At that time, the sweet white eyes were often used, decorated with Su Ma Liqing, and bright red was treasured", which showed the rarity of bright red.
The Palace Museum has a bright red glazed bowl
In volume 27 of the "Jiangxi Tongzhi" during the Kangxi Dynasty of the Qing Dynasty, there is a record of Fuliang County in the twenty-sixth year of Jiajing in the Ming Dynasty: "Jiangxi Buzheng Sicheng said that the bright red table utensils were all awarded by high craftsmen, re-rewarded, and the firing was not completed, and he wanted to transform the red vessels according to the nine years of Jiajing. Although it is said that during the Jiajing period, Jiangxi could no longer burn high-temperature red glaze, and could only use the alum red glaze fired at a lower temperature as a substitute, it also pointed out the ruler's pursuit of imperial red glaze with one stone, and the difficulty and cost of the process of firing high-temperature red glaze. The exploration of concentrated firing of high-temperature red glazes was also interrupted for more than 200 years due to economic weakness, political turmoil, and scarcity of materials, until the Kangxi period of the Qing Dynasty. If the Ming Dynasty fired red glaze because the monarch liked red and burned it as a place for sacrifice, the Rulers of the Qing Dynasty added an intention to show their national strength on this basis. After Kangxi came to power, he created the prosperous era of the Qing Dynasty and the prosperity of the country, and decided to re-burn red-glazed porcelain. Under the supervision of the inspector Lang Tingji, the Royal Kiln Factory studied the glaze formula and firing method, and although the high-temperature copper red glaze porcelain fired was different from the bright red glaze of Xuande, the color was as thick as cattle blood, and some of the glazes were dark red, which was interesting. Under the strong light, the glaze reflects a glass-like luster, which is clear and intense, like a layer of gemstones evenly attached to the white tire, which is pleasing to the eye. Because the glaze juice is thicker and thicker, it is inevitable to flow when firing, and the red porcelain of the Lang kiln often exposes a circle of white tires at the mouth edge, commonly known as the "lamp grass edge"; and for the glaze does not soak the bottom foot, the craftsman uses a scraper to scrape out a two-tier platform on the outside of the circle foot, so there is a saying of "blurting the foot lang does not flow". According to the documents of the Qing Palace and the Raozhou Imperial Kiln Factory, "Blurting out snow top is better, flowing glaze is wonderful with cow hair silk, glaze is not enough, and chicken wing wood grain is respected", and the officials who select the red tribute of Lang Kiln are enshrined as a guideline. The official standard implies that the firing of such utensils has entered a more mature stage, and there are enough manpower and materials for mass production.
Since the mid-1990s, Langyao red glaze vessels have repeatedly appeared on auction auctions, along with the cowpea red glaze varieties newly created by the Jingdezhen kilns in the late Kangxi Dynasty. Since the successful firing of pure to positive Lang kiln red porcelain, cowpea red has artificially derived other colors in monochrome red, sometimes due to red glaze oxidation to produce green kiln changes, but make the red slightly transparent green, so it has the reputation of beauty Ji, peach blossom pieces and so on. Xu Zhiheng of the Republic of China wrote in the "Drinking Liuzhai Porcelain": "The beauty of Ji is that the bright red and tea brown dots appear in the light red, and the backlight shows green." Zhu Yan of the Qing Dynasty mentioned the firing method of cowpea red in the "Tao Shu", and its method was called blowing red: "Cut a bamboo cylinder seven inches long and one inch in diameter, covered with fine sand at one end, and blown onto the blank with glazed water." This seemingly firing defect, but in fact a special color meter, has been favored by Japanese and Western collectors since the 19th century. Cowpea red is translated as "Peachbloom (peach blossom glaze)" in the West, its green is soft as a peach leaf, and its red is gentle like a peach blossom, such an English translation actually vividly describes the characteristics of cowpea red.
The firing of red glaze has gone from the uneven red jun kiln, to the pure lang kiln red, to the intentional irregular cowpea red, which has been tried by craftsmen for several dynasties. The red glaze pieces that have been handed down to this day are exquisite, and there is a warm vitality under the glaze color. It may not be like blue and white porcelain, which is generally a Chinese symbol in the eyes of the world, but the red glaze of various colors has endured for more than a hundred years. This smear has always been the lingering favorite of successive monarchs.
The Palace Museum hides the red glazed Guanyin bottle of the Lang kiln
Red Lacquerware: A ride in lacquerware
Before the development of porcelain into national utensils, lacquerware was used very well in the lives of the people and in the court army, and with the advent of durable and cheap ceramics, lacquerware was marginalized because of its long production cycle and easy wear and tear, and gradually became an artifact used by the aristocratic class. Among them, carving lacquer technology is an important technique in lacquerware production, in fact, the color is far more than red, but also includes yellow, green, black, rhinoceros, color, etc. Now we can see the heirloom to red the most. Ancient lacquerware in the early days mostly found in Han tomb excavations, mainly black and red, five generations of lacquerware production center moved south to Jiangsu and Zhejiang regions, Song and Yuan period folk workshops flourished, but also in the Ming Dynasty generations of famous masters, such as Zhang Cheng, Yang Mao and others. In the Qing Dynasty, lacquerware was deeply loved by the Qianlong Emperor, and the red lacquerware was even more dusty, showing the scenery. At this time, the shape of the red lacquerware is changeable, no longer stuck to the table utensils, the carving technique is more delicate and slender, and the overall aesthetic style tends to be cumbersome and gorgeous.
The Palace Museum has a collection of "Zhang Chengzao" red gardenia pattern disc
Vermilion lacquerware was much appreciated by the officials and people because of its brilliant colors, and the market scene near the City God Temple in Beijing in the Ming Dynasty is described in volume 50 of the "Old Wen Kao of the Sun": "The original City God Temple opened in the west of Guancheng, three days a month. The furnishings are very rammed, the daily necessities of life, the fine and rough, the guests of the travel, but with a block into the market, instantly rich and perfect... Other red-filled paint old things, those who come out of the inner court, are particularly fine." The interesting thing is that perhaps because the lacquerware process is rare, the audience is mostly aristocratic, and the rulers did not bind the red lacquerware with the festival system, so the lacquerware production of the Yuan and Ming dynasties rarely paid attention to the intention of greeting Xiangrui. In addition, folk craftsmen were quite influenced by the ideas of the literati, and at that time, red lacquerware was mostly seen in landscape figure paintings. Volume 24 of the Records of Emperor Taizong of Ming records a list of gifts given to the princesses on the day of the first year of Yongle's award, including carved lacquer boxes, plates, fruit plates, etc. The decorative ornamentation is mainly based on the story of the characters, supplemented by many flowers and grass ornaments. Floral motifs are also the key decoration of Ming lacquerware, usually carved with large flowers in the center, surrounded by lush foliage, or wrapped in small flower buds, showing the feeling of the stars holding the moon. The Ming Dynasty Yongle Year Red Lotus Eight Auspicious Pattern Round Box in the Qing Palace's old collection is a representative of the classic ornamentation, with lotus flowers and eight treasures contrasting, and the layout also meets the paradigm standards. The center of the cover is carved with a blooming lotus flower, surrounded by Buddhist eight treasures decorated with eight treasures, in turn for wheels, snails, umbrellas, covers, flowers, pots, fish, intestines, each treasure is under the lotus flower support, customarily called lotus eight treasures, meaning "eight treasures radiance". There are 24 lotus flowers carved on the upper and lower walls of the box. The outsole is painted ochre, and the needle near the foot is marked with the "Daming Yongle Year System" line book. Lotus flowers and eight treasures were widely used in various handicrafts and decorative patterns of buildings in the Ming and Qing dynasties, especially porcelain, reflecting the integration of religious ideas and art crafts.
The Qianlong Emperor favored lacquerware, and often drew patterns by the Qing Dynasty Manufacturing Office and handed them to Suzhou Weaving for production, such as a red-carved lacquer five bats holding shou snuff bottle. At this time, the craftsman carved the pattern at a high level, more delicate and delicate than the previous dynasty, and the knife technique was swift and sharp, but if it was needed by the inner court, the opportunity for free creation was correspondingly reduced. The patterns of the court utensils are mostly taken from the meaning of Hong fu longevity and ruyi auspiciousness, and have a distinct and unified court aesthetic style. At the same time, the scope of use of carved lacquer extends from the desk items in the study room to furniture decorations, such as the Red Fushou Pattern Kang Ji in the Qianlong Period, the side edges and leg reliefs of bats, the opening light holes between the legs on both sides, and the upper edge of the open light is decorated with the Ruyi cloud head pattern. At this stage, the auspicious pattern and the vermilion color complement each other perfectly, and the heavenly style is more prominent.
The Palace Museum's Tibetan red carved lacquer "Five Bats Holding Shou" snuff bottle
Red coral: rare is precious, because of the color of the joy
If the use of red glazed porcelain and vermilion lacquerware is a deliberate choice among man-made products, red coral is loved by court nobles because of its precious rarity and natural vermilion. From the placement of natural coral trees for ornamentation, to the luxurious decoration of living utensils, to the deliberate processing of bonsai jewelry for the needs of etiquette, the cultural meaning of red coral is also layered and plump in the evolution of ancient history.
The gilded inlaid beast-shaped brick box excavated from the Eastern Han Tomb in Xuzhou, Jiangsu Province, is embedded with red coral, turquoise and lapis lazuli, which is dazzling and should be the earliest red coral in the excavated cultural relics. In volume I of the Jin Dynasty's "Miscellaneous Records of Xijing", the red coral tree placed in the Shanglin Garden of the Han Dynasty is described as follows: "There are coral trees in the grass pond, one foot tall and two feet high, a book of three kes, and there are 462 articles on it, which were donated by Zhao Tuo, the king of Nanyue, and are known as beacon trees." At night, always want to burn." Natural red coral grows in the deep sea of 100 to 2000 meters, is formed by the natural accumulation of corals, can not be artificially farmed, and only grows in the Taiwan Strait and the Japanese Strait of the mainland, so the South Vietnamese lord near the water tower, can get red coral trees to the Han Emperor. Since the Tang Dynasty, coral has been used to make study pen holders or boudoir draperies, etc., and became more popular in the Ming and Qing dynasties, and red corals are most popular among the coral families for their pleasing colors. At the same time, because it is located in the Seven Treasures listed in the Amitabha Sutra and the Prajnaparamita Sutra, the red coral not only has the blessing of Buddhist thought, but also attracts the attention of the inner court of the court.
Bonsai of saffron coral trees in the Palace Museum
A red coral tree bonsai made by the Qing Palace Office is made of three-layer peach-style pots made of gilded, filigree enamel, painting enamel and other processes. The branches and leaves are coiled at the bottom of the pot, interspersed in three layers of double peach pots, and two bats in front of and behind the clay pot spread their wings and hold up the word "Shou" of the filigree enamel group. In the pot is a bright and moist red coral tree about half a meter high, which corresponds to the verse "The tree has no flowers and leaves, and it is not stone nor Qiong". The coral emerald auspicious bonsai made in the late Qing Dynasty has carried out a more flexible and varied artificial carving of the coral, which can be described as ingenious and exquisite: the bonsai uses red coral as the trunk and the jadeite as the green leaf. The emerald lotus leaves under the tree are wrapped in green silk as lotus stems, and each is inlaid with pearls and tourmalines. The upper part of the "Auspicious Qing Youyu" pendant is a copper gilded crystal chime, and two large goldfish carved from red coral are hung at both ends of the pendant, and the dark red beeswax is inlaid with fish eyes. The "Fu Shou Shuang Quan" pendant on both sides of the tree also has smaller coral goldfish at the upper end and coral rice bead spikes at the lower end. The two pieces of bonsai are rich in materials, exquisite and gorgeous, and the craftsmanship is complex, which is an auspicious scenery that is only displayed on the day of the emperor's birthday. It also shows the craftsman's ingenious design ingenuity and skillful handling skills of red coral at this time, which shows that red coral is abundant and has the meaning of good fortune and auspiciousness.
Author: Han Changjun (PhD candidate, Department of History, Shanghai University)
Editor: Fan Xin
Planner: Fan Xin
Editor-in-Charge: Huang Qizhe
*Wenhui exclusive manuscript, please indicate the source when reprinting.