The Porcelain of Hung-Hsien

Porcelain of Hung-Hsien
Adoption Amount: $250
Category: Build and Access the Collection
Location: Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery Library

The porcelain of Hung-Hsien : a study of the socio-cultural background and some characteristics of the porcelain produced at Chingtechen during the Imperial reign of Yuan Shih-kai (1916)

By H. A. van Oort. Lochem: De Tijdstroom, 1970.

In 1913, Yuan Shih-k’ai (Yuan Shikai, 1859-1916) became the first president of the Republic of China after he helped Sun Yan-sen overthrow the last Qing emperor in 1911. In 1915, Yuan proclaimed himself the Hung-Hsien (Hongxian) Emperor but ruled for only 83 days before being forced to back down from his claim. During his very short imperial reign, Yuan ordered Guo Baochang to re-start the manufacturing of imperial porcelain at Jingdezhen which had ceased production with the fall of the last Qing emperor. The author of this book discusses the style, quality, and influence of this porcelain within the larger, historical context of production at Jingdezhen. It is a very interesting and important overview of this period because this renaissance in the political landscape split the cultural elite into two groups: a “forward looking and backward looking group,” which in turn affected techniques and aesthetic conceptions in porcelain production.

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