Genuine Blue and White porcelain shown for the first time
Yuan Blue and White Porcelain from Jingdezhen tell a story of trade, craftsmanship and ancient exchange
Fragment of an ewer with phoenix design in underglaze blue, Jingdezhen ware Jiangxi province. Excavated from the kiln site at Luomaqiao in 2023
Yuan Blue and White Porcelain
Yuan Blue and White: New Discoveries from Jingdezhen presents over 400 blue and white porcelain objects that tell a story of trade, craftsmanship, and cultural exchange across the ancient world.
The exhibition centres on blue & white porcelain, a product that changed ceramics forever.
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Surprisingly, a significant portion of the exhibition features pottery shards and incomplete vessels.
Go container with five-clawed dragon in underglaze blue Jingdezhen ware, Jiangxi province Yuan (1271-1368), Excavated from the kiln site at Doufunong in 1988
Rather than present only perfect artefacts, the conservation team decided that these imperfect objects offered opportunities to teach about both their past and present.
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The Yuan dynasty (1271-1368) ruled what would become one of history’s largest empires. The Mongol rulers inherited a vast territory spanning from Eastern Europe to the Pacific.
This scale mattered to ceramics production. The dynasty’s policies supported trade, farming, and craftsmanship. Stability allowed workshops to flourish.
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The kilns of Jingdezhen, in what is now Jiangxi province, benefited from this order.
Meiping vase with phoenix and peony in underglaze blue Jingdezhen ware, Jiangxi province Yuan (1271-1368). Blue & White PorcelainDiscovered in Trowulan
They responded by creating something that no workshop had made before: porcelain painted with cobalt pigment beneath the glaze.
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The technique emerged from convergence. Potters at Jingdezhen had worked with celadon glazes and underglaze browns for centuries.
Islamic and Chinese craftsmen shared knowledge through trade networks
They possessed the knowledge to fire kilns to temperatures that permanently fused glazes to clay.
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Islamic and Chinese craftsmen working in the Yuan territories shared technical knowledge through courts and trade networks.
Yuhuchun vase with figural scene in underglaze blue, Jingdezhen ware, Jiangxi province, Yuan (1271-1368). Discovered in Trowulan, East Java, Indonesia
The result was blue and white porcelain, an innovation that spread worldwide within decades.
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This process can be traced through the exhibition’s three sections.
The first section presents ceramics that predate blue-and-white production under the heading Winds from the Steppe: Development of Yuan Dynasty Ceramics.
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A jar with overlapping leaf patterns in underglaze brown, created at Jizhou in Jiangxi province, shows how potters worked before the breakthrough.
Designs and glaze demonstrate the precision of kilnwork
A plate bearing incised lotus designs and celadon glaze, made at Longquan in Zhejiang, demonstrates the precision of kilnwork.
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A faceted jarlet with white glaze from Dehua, Fujian, reveals the range of bodies and finishes that workshops produced.
A jar showing a dragon and phoenix in underglaze brown, from Cizhou in Hebei, demonstrates that multiple regions contributed to ceramic innovation.
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The show’s second section, titled Exchange and Integration: Production and Use of Yuan Blue and White Porcelain, contains fragments and complete vessels that illustrate the moment of invention.
Dish with paired phoenixes in underglaze blue Jingdezhen ware, Jiangxi province, Yuan (1271-1368)
Watching conservation unfold across the gallery offers insight into how museums preserve broken ceramics.
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A dish painted with paired phoenixes in underglaze blue exemplifies the refinement of this new technique.
The work shows control. The birds sit balanced, their forms suggesting movement across the vessel’s interior.
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Yet many pieces tell a story through damage. A fragment of an ewer bearing a phoenix design in underglaze blue, excavated from the kiln site at Luomaqiao in 2023, survived centuries of burial.
Fragments of a meiping vase with dragon design in underglaze blue, Jingdezhen ware, Jiangxi province, Yuan (1271-1368) Excavated from the kiln site at Luomaqiao in 2023
The ewer’s spout and handle fell away. The museum’s research team, working with archaeologists and conservators from the Jingdezhen Imperial Kiln Institute, faced a question: how to present this fragment?
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Rather than leave it incomplete, they proposed a conservation approach combining plaster infills and 3D printing to suggest the vessel’s original form.
On display are reconstructed sections that help explain the creation process.
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Two meipings, vessels designed to hold pruned branches of flowering trees, show different treatments.
Left, Faceted jarlet with white glaze, Dehua ware, Fujian province, Yuan (1271-1368), right, Jarlet with moulded design and white glaze, Dehua ware, Fujian province, Yuan (1271-1368)
The first meiping, bearing fragments of a dragon design and excavated at Luomaqiao in 2023, remains partially incomplete, allowing visitors to see the damage time inflicted.
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The second meiping, with a blue-painted figural scene, comes from the same kiln site and excavation year.
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These meiping vessels sit side by side, offering a point of comparison. One retains sections of figural narrative across its body.
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The other requires the imagination to complete the image. This transparency in restoration demonstrates respect for the object’s history and recovery.
The third section, titled Global Convergence: Overseas Consumption and the Global Influence of Yuan Blue and White Porcelain, shifts focus to the objects’ journeys across trade routes.
Plate with incised lotus design and celadon glaze, Longquan ware Zhejiang province Yuan (1271-1368)
Ceramics reached Southeast Asia, Western Asia, and beyond through maritime routes.
A meiping with phoenix and peony motifs, discovered in Trowulan, East Java, Indonesia, testifies to this reach.
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It travelled thousands of miles to a location where local collectors valued its form and decoration.
A yuhuchun, a bulbous vessel with a narrow mouth, bearing a figural scene in underglaze blue and discovered in the same Indonesian location, travelled the same routes.
left, Jar with overlapping leaf pattern in underglaze brown, Jizhou ware, Jiangxi province, Southern Song to Yuan (1127-1368), center, Vase with flowers and birds in Underglaze brown, Jizhou ware, Jiangxi province, Southern Song (1127-1279), right, Jar with carved plum sprays and black glaze, Jizhou ware, Jiangxi province Southern Song (1127-1279)
Yuhuchun vessels, designed to hold wine or water, suggest that Yuan blue and white served multiple functions across contexts.
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Some held wine at courts. Others remained in workshops as stock. Still others crossed oceans to reach communities in Southeast Asia who found meaning and utility in their forms.
The exhibition challenges the assumption that Yuan blue and white porcelain appealed solely to Western Asian markets.
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The ceramics found in Indonesia demonstrate that Asian communities beyond the Ming territories claimed these objects as their own.
Jarlet with moulded design and white glaze Dehua ware, Fujian province, Yuan (1271-1368)
They incorporated them into daily life, trade transactions, and status and display practices.
Through a window into exchange, the Yuan Blue and White exhibition illustrate a fact that textbooks sometimes miss: cultures exchange materials, techniques, and tastes develop through ordinary commerce.
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No spectacular event created blue and white porcelain. Instead, potters inherited knowledge from predecessors, observed innovations from neighbours, and responded to demand from merchants and courts.
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They combined techniques and materials until something emerged that no workshop had made before. That creation spread across the world because people wanted it, valued it, and carried it along trade routes.
Fragments of a meiping vase with figural scene in underglaze blue, Jingdezhen ware, Jiangxi province, Yuan (1271-1368). Excavated from the kiln site at Luomaqiao in 2023
Appreciating this exhibition, Yuan Blue and White: New Discoveries from Jingdezhen at the Art Gallery of the Chinese University of Hong Kong, is a more cerebral experience than most museum offerings.
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Allow time to contemplate the fragments and vessels slowly, observe the conservation work, and trace the journey of blue and white porcelain from the kilns of Jingdezhen to the courts and homes of Asia, the Middle East, and the present moment.
Text and photos Martin Wray
