The short reign of Yung Chêng, who succeeded K’ang Hsi in 1723, witnessed still further advances in the direction of technical perfection, accompanied on the artistic side by a corresponding growth of the tendency to over-refinement. The discovery during the latter years of K’ang Hsi of a rose-coloured enamel derived from gold, varying in shade from pink to crimson, opened the way for a revolution in the colour-scheme which is the chief characteristic of the painted porcelain of Yung Chêng and his successor Ch’ien Lung. From the prevalence of this colour, the type of porcelain on which it occurs received the name of “famille rose” among French connoisseurs. The widened range of the enamel-painter’s palette made possible a completely naturalistic manner, in which all conventionalism of treatment was abandoned. No album of flora can show more faithful botanical drawings than are to be seen in such exquisite subjects after nature as that in the piece reproduced in [Plate 2]; in no work on ornithology could be found truer renderings of bird life. The plate, painted with a bird of the kingfisher family perched on the branch of a gnarled plum-tree in flower, belongs to the collection bequeathed by Mr. W. H. Cope. The spray of blossoming pomegranate which completes the composition is naturally rendered by means of the newly-invented carmine enamel. While we may question the fitness of a subject thus treated for the decoration of a porcelain plate, we cannot but admire the exquisite delicacy of the painting and the skilful arrangement of the composition.
PLATE 12
Toilette-pot and Cover, St. Cloud, about 1700, with ormolu mount of the period. Height, 8¾ in. Given by Mr. J. H. Fitzhenry.
No. C 457-1909. See p. [50].
Mark concealed by the mounting.
Perhaps the most famous of the productions of the Yung Chêng period are the plates and cups and saucers of thin “egg-shell” china with enamel decoration of figure-subjects or birds and flowers enclosed within elaborate borders of complex diaper. The same fine porcelain was employed as a material for lanterns; fine examples of these are exhibited in the Victoria and Albert Museum.
Concurrently with such technical refinements as these, there came about under Yung Chêng an archaistic revival of ancient wares, resulting from the commission given by the emperor for the reproduction of the ceramic treasures of past centuries preserved in his palaces. Imitations were made both of the shapes and of the numerous varieties of glaze of the factories of the Sung dynasty, while in the “blue and white” category the spotted manner of painting already noticed as characteristic of the reign of Hsüan Tê was specially in favour. Another ancient type extensively reproduced was the “five colour” class of the later Ming emperors. Where there cannot be traced a refinement in the handling of the design foreign to the earlier painters, the copies are readily distinguished from their prototypes by a difference in the quality of the colours employed. The underglaze cobalt-blue has a decidedly violet nuance, a delicate lilac replaces the earlier purple, and the green is of a lighter grass-coloured hue; furthermore, the enamel colours often display a faint iridescence where the light glances on them. The vase represented in [Plate 9] is a fine example of this archaistic school of the time of Yung Chêng. The shape, of noble simplicity, dates back to the earliest period of the Ming dynasty, but the decoration belongs to the “five colour” type of Wan Li. The design is composed of a dragon and a mythical phœnix (fêng huang), emblems of the emperor, amid flowers and foliage of the tree-peony on wavy stems. The breadth of treatment, the vigorous drawing, the masterly balance of the colouring, entitle this vase to a place among the best performances of the Chinese potter.
By the time of the Emperor Ch’ien Lung, whose reign of sixty years ended in 1795, deteriorating influences made themselves felt with ever-increasing insistence, and the story of Chinese porcelain from this time forward is a record of steady decline. The seeds of decay may be considered to have been planted about the beginning of the seventeenth century, when the establishment of the European trading companies brought China into close and constant touch with the Western world. The new markets thus opened for Chinese products inevitably brought about the creation of a new style in Chinese art to suit the taste of European buyers. Traces of Western influence may be discerned, if not in the decoration, at all events in the forms of Chinese porcelain all through the seventeenth century, and in K’ang Hsi’s reign its effect is fully apparent. The splendid rebirth of art and culture consequent upon the restoration of peace in the empire under his rule availed for a time to check the sinister effect of these changes; but as the eighteenth century advanced, a new class of wares affecting shapes unknown to Oriental customs and designed to meet Western requirements, was produced in ever-increasing quantities, and did not fail to influence the whole output of the Chinese kilns. The commercial spirit thus engendered, hastened the decline already originated by too close attention to the technical side of ceramic craftsmanship. The result is seen in the shapeless extravagances, wonderful in technique, but devoid of grace and beauty, produced in the latter years of Ch’ien Lung, and in the dreary “India china” made for export through the various India companies of Europe. There was a momentary gleam of revival in the nineteenth century under Taou Kuang, when creditable copies were made of some of the Yung Chêng designs, but such imitative efforts do not avail to arouse the interest of those to whom the art of a country ceases to appeal, when it reflects the genius of a people no longer in the full vigour of manhood.