How beautiful is the red porcelain in the blue and white glaze?

How beautiful is the red porcelain in the blue and white glaze? This is a lot of people's doubts. Wang Zhanggui of Jingdezhen summed up the characteristics of blue and white glaze red to talk about this problem, hoping to help you:

Blue and white glaze red, commonly known as "blue and white with purple", is a porcelain decoration technique that adds decorative patterns between blue and white with glaze red. Blue-and-white refers to the underglaze color which is colored with blue-and-white material, then applied with transparent glaze and fired at a high temperature of about1300 C. The red in glaze refers to the pigment prepared with copper oxide (copper flower) as the colorant. Draw the pattern on the blank (or the blank soil with blue and white glaze first), then cover it with a layer of blue and white glaze, and then put it into the kiln. After the strong reducing flame atmosphere of 1250c ~ 1280c, high-priced copper was reduced to low-priced copper, showing a delicate and calm appearance.

The underglaze red is one of the traditional underglaze decorations in China. It is called "red in glaze" because it uses copper as colorant, draws various patterns on the blank, then coats transparent glaze and fires it in a high-temperature reducing atmosphere. Because it is difficult to burn qualified products, its products are extremely valuable. The underglaze red is decorated separately, but mostly with blue and white, which is called "blue and white underglaze red". Blue and white are noble and elegant, and the glaze is red, rich and lively. Therefore, blue and white make up for the lack of color gradation change of underglaze red, and underglaze red enriches the color of blue and white porcelain, so people compare underglaze red of blue and white to "phoenix in fire", which is the aesthetic value of underglaze red of blue and white. Blue and white flowers have profound meanings and strong national characteristics. They are painted on varied white porcelain tires and decorated with underglaze red, just like elegant Chinese paintings, which are more ornamental. Blue and white underglaze red decoration has wide adaptability to porcelain modeling. The shape of art porcelain is mostly bottle-shaped, and the shape changes endlessly, generally including size, height and width. For the same shape, upper and lower straight lines and curves are used alternately. Among them, plum bottles with small mouth, short collar, rich shoulders, tall and straight, and small bottom are decorated with blue and white underglaze red pictures, which complement each other and are intriguing. Its comely beauty, like a comely girl, can transcend the boundaries of time and space and has been loved by Chinese and foreign people for thousands of years. Modern, the quiver and all kinds of exaggerated and changeable shapes, even incomplete and beautiful shapes, are decorated with blue and white glazed red pictures, which are all very interesting.

The characteristic of underglaze red is that it is difficult to burn and the yield is extremely low. It uses copper as colorant, directly draws various patterns and patterns on the white tire, and applies a layer of glaze on it. Copper will emit red in high temperature reducing flame, so it is called "underglaze red".

In-glaze red porcelain was created and fired in the Yuan Dynasty, but the quantity is very small, which can be described as rare. The reason is that copper ions are extremely sensitive to temperature and cannot be heated in the kiln, showing black-red or gray-red; After heating, copper ions will volatilize and escape from the glaze layer, showing a unique flushing or simply fading phenomenon, and the decoration is incoherent. It was difficult to control the kiln temperature at that time. It is impossible to make it on a large scale only by comparing the experience of the reactor master and the fire photos taken. Moreover, Yuan people are still white, Han people are still red, and their national identity is different, so the output of underglaze red has been very small.

In-glaze red was born in Jingdezhen kiln in Yuan Dynasty. It is an underglaze colored porcelain which is first coated with copper red material, then coated with transparent glaze, and once fired in a high-temperature reducing atmosphere. Because red is under glaze, it is named under glaze red. In fact, copper, as a glaze colorant, has been used in ceramics for a long time, and it has also been seen in lead glazed pottery unearthed in Han Dynasty, just because it was green in the low-temperature oxidation atmosphere at that time. According to the ceramic fragments unearthed from archaeology, Changsha kiln in Tang Dynasty tried to use copper as colorant to fire porcelain in high-temperature reducing atmosphere, but the firing technology was still in the primitive stage because of scarce output, poor tire quality and dim color. The Song Dynasty was a prosperous period in the history of China ceramics. Unfortunately, no trace of red under the glaze was found in any kiln, let alone the appearance of the utensils, which is probably related to the Song people's preference for fresh, pure, moist and elegant plain porcelain.

Generally, there are three kinds of decoration methods for in-glaze red porcelain, namely, line drawing (the most common decoration method is to draw lines and patterns directly on the porcelain tire), line drawing (leaving patterns on the in-glaze red as the background) and painting (the copper red appears irregularly on the porcelain tire in sheets and blocks). The firing of red porcelain in glaze requires extremely strict kiln temperature. At the high temperature above 1300℃, the allowable temperature difference between the upper and lower parts shall not exceed 10℃. If the temperature is low, the color of the pattern will be dark gray. On the other hand, if the temperature is higher, the pigment will melt, fly away and disappear. In ancient times, only experienced and skilled kiln workers could burn bright and pure underglaze red. It is precisely because the firing rejection rate of glazed red porcelain is too high and the yield is too low that it is precious and is known as the treasure of thousands of kilns.

Hope to adopt, thank you!