People who play ancient porcelain, as soon as they hear "Hongwu porcelain", will immediately appear on the brain: milky glaze with milky white, poor transparency, quite jade texture, blue and white color gray or black, or slightly blue, halo serious, carcass similar to Yuan Dynasty kiln, than Yongxuan time appears thicker. Many insiders are not particularly optimistic about its collection value.
Ming Hongwu glaze red entwined peony pattern bowl.
Collection of the Palace Museum.
On the contrary, I think that Hongwu kilnware plays a special historical role in connecting the past and the future, and has a high status in the history of ancient Chinese ceramics.
After Zhu Yuanzhang, the great ancestor of the Ming Dynasty, ascended the throne, he did not weaken the status of the imperial kiln in Jingdezhen, on the contrary, "in the second year of Hongwu, 20 new kilns were built in Jingdezhen, which were specially used to make imperial utensils, only to produce excellent products, regardless of the cost, so the porcelain industry made rapid progress, and the prosperity of the Song Dynasty was completely restored in a few years." (Quoted from Zhao Ruzhen's "Antique Guide").
If this point of view is true, the Hongwu kiln should not lose to the kiln of the Fuliang Porcelain Bureau of the Yuan Dynasty, but many people think: the blue and white hair color and painting work of the Hongwu kiln are not as good as the previous dynasty
Left: Ming Hongwu blue and white peony pattern jade pot spring bottle.
Right Yuan Jingdezhen kiln blue and white cloud dragon pattern plum vase.
Collection of the Palace Museum.
In fact, in terms of the color and painting of blue and white alone, Hongwu blue and white is indeed not as beautiful as the color and painting of Yuan blue and white. But I think it has a sense of simplicity and ancient beauty that Yuan blue and white porcelain does not have.
This is also an effect that Emperor Hongwu deliberately pursued, which was very different from that of the Yuan Dynasty. If Emperor Hongwu wants to imitate the Yuan Dynasty, it should not be much difficult, most of the craftsmen who made imperial porcelain in the Yuan Dynasty are still there, and there is no shortage of porcelain-making materials. It can only be understood that Emperor Hongwu wants to fire porcelain that has not seen the ancients before and those who have not seen after him, and he wants to create a unique pattern and a unique style. He was unwilling to follow in the footsteps of the Yuan Dynasty, and there was a certain breakthrough in the model, seeing more large vessels, the diameter of the plate and bowl was as large as 60-70cm, and the general jar was also mostly large.
Ming Hongwu blue and white folded branch floral pattern**.
Collection of the Palace Museum.
In short, although no genuine porcelain from the Luohongwu Dynasty has been found so far, it has obvious characteristics of the era and is easy to identify. In recent years, chemical tests on Ming Dynasty porcelain have found that only Hongwu porcelain and Chenghua porcelain glaze contain the least lime calcium, so it presents a strong jade texture - dense and warm. It can be seen that the glaze formula of Chenghua porcelain is influenced by Hongwu porcelain.
Ming Hongwu Suihan Sanyou glazed red pot.
Collection of the Goshodo Museum.
Jingdezhen Ceramic Archaeology Institute believes that the color of Hongwu blue and white is either black or gray, which is related to the blue and white materials used, and the blue and white materials used are left after refining and processing in the Yuan Dynasty. I think this is debatable.
First, there is no record that during the Hongwu period, Jingdezhen's imported Su Ma was used upSecond, even if the rest is used, the content of high iron and low manganese will not change, and there will be no color phenomenon that is so different from Yuan porcelain.
Ming Hongwu blue and white floral pattern holding pot.
Collection of the Palace Museum.
The works presented by the craftsmen of the imperial kiln must be the reflection of the emperor's aesthetic taste during that period, and the embodiment of the emperor's will. No one dares to risk the world's greatness, and it is not against the rule of self-inflicted wisdom to show it. Ming Taizu came from a humble background, although he was not educated, but he was very smart, and he appreciated the heavy, clumsy, and huge shape in his preference for utensils, which suited his aesthetic taste. According to historical records, the Hongwu Dynasty was most successful in vegan cyan and black porcelain. I was fortunate enough to receive a black prismatic general jar 56 centimeters high. Only from the appearance of the glaze, I thought it was Shandong Zibo kiln, after carefully looking at the fetal quality and bottom foot, it was determined that it was Jingdezhen Hongwu kiln, the fetus was white and delicate, and the kaolin of the door was opened!
At the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, Hongwu to Yongle Longquan kiln celadon flower Basho Lake stone holding pot.
Collection of the National Palace Museum, Taipei.
The shape of the vessel is regular, the glaze is black and bright, the body size is huge, it is a rare piece of fine product in the Hongwu kiln. This jar confirms my inference that in addition to firing a unique color of blue and white porcelain, Hongwu also fired particularly sophisticated works, which inherited many advantages of Jingdezhen imperial porcelain in the Yuan Dynasty, and on the basis of transformation, innovation and formation of its own unique appearance, but also laid the foundation for the development of Ming Yongxuan porcelain. If there is no bold innovation of Ming Hongwu porcelain, there will be no peak period of Yongxuan porcelain, and there is no unique style of Chenghua porcelain. Hongwu porcelain has played a good role as a bridge connecting the past and the next, and its historical position in the history of ancient ceramics cannot be erased.
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