Ceramics 11


Achaemenid Empire. Since then, the image of the bird, king of the spiritual world, has always been central in Zoroastrian divinatory belief. Unfortunately, the association between these peculiar ewers and wine rests solely on epigraphic sources, for lack of material evidence’. Wine drinking in China during the


Sui and Tang dynasties was already widespread among soldiers and commoners, who could hardly afford silver goblets. Here, Chinese ingenuity came


to the rescue, Laura Vigo considers a different


theme on the influential spread of Chinese ceramics in her chapter ‘Of Pilgrims and Moons’, writing ‘Te migration of shapes and motifs from one medium to another became particularly momentous in China during the reign of the Yongle emperor (r 1402-1424) of the Ming dynasty (1368-1644). Te desire for


producing


knockoffs in clay, a more economic, readily available material. All the known ewers in China, from between the 6th and 9th centuries, are glazed earthenware. More often than not, these vases were not utilitarian, as the spout was closed and could not be used to pour liquids – these objects were often found in funerary contexts. However, a large ewer with a phoenix- head spout found in the Belitung shipwreck of an Arab dhow, which had departed from China in the 9th century, seems to suggest that similar vessels were also prized exotic objects in Iraq, during the Abbasid Caliphate. Interestingly, unlike the Chinese, who translated Sogdian forms and motifs, it seems that in Iraq this shape was never reinterpreted to satisfy local tastes. In a related chapter, Nicoletta Fazio


writes about the rise in popularity of Chinese ceramics and their spread in the West in the chapter entitled


‘Waves of Cobalt Ceramics Between ‘Abbasid Iraq and Tang China’, in which she explains,


everything Chinese among the


‘Abbasid urban elites was singled out by the writer al-Ta‘alibi, who notes that they “used to call every delicate or curiously made vessel and such like, whatever its real origin, Chinese, because finely-made things are a specialty of China”. Chinese pottery was massively exported by boat from southern China to the ports of Siraf, Suhar, Muscat, and Basra on ‘Abbasid territory, across


the Maritime Silk


Road. Te discovery of large shipwrecks off the coast of Belitung (circa 826) and Cirebon (late 9th/10th century) in Southeast Asian waters indicates the sheer scale of this trade, highlighting the political and commercial interests between


‘Abbasid Baghdad and Tang Chang’an’. Fazio continues, ‘Baghdad became


a treasure-trove of Chinese rarities, boosting the economy and inspiring artisans. To cater to ‘Abbasid clientele and capitalise on the success of Chinese pottery (mostly produced in the kilns of Gongxian in Henan and Xing and Ding in Hebei in northern China), Iraqi potters replicated its appearance, reproducing shapes and using a white glaze containing lead and tin on an earthen- ware biscuit to imitate the characteristic sheen of Chinese ceramics. Te white surfaces and minimalist shapes offered a fertile ground to the Iraqi potters, and they started decorating bowls, plates, and vessels with stylized motifs and fine Arabic calligraphy in cobalt blue paint and soft touches of copper green that appealed to West Asian buyers. We cannot however assume that the development of this kind of ceramics was the work of Iraqi potters alone, unless employed in the workshops serving the caliphal courts of Baghdad and Samarra. Rather, we should imagine a dynamic dialogue between supply and demand, with Arab and Persian merchants acting as middlemen, connecting communities of makers and customers between the Gulf and southern China. Potters were likely active across Iraq and might have been inspired by the high- end ceramic production for the ‘Abbasid elites’.


‘Te craze for


‘foreign’ objects and their adaptation was the result of increased trade and diplomatic connections, especially with the Timurid court in Central Asia. Te porcelain flask from the Palazzo Madama collection reflects this artistic and cultural entanglement, as the material result of increased curiosity between these distant, albeit close, lands and their people. In the early 15th century, when this flask was made, the land routes that had been paved centuries earlier by the Sogdians were still connecting China and Central Asia (especially the Timurids) and were used to trade Islamic metal- work for porcelain’. In the exhibition, a Ming-dynasty


moon flask from Jingdezhen, China, shows this merging of cultures and taste. Potters in China, reacted to the demand and the changes in the taste of foreign buyers and manufactured foreign-looking ceramics for domestic consumption,


too, bringing


influences from Central Asia, and further west, back home. Exoticism and material desire went both ways, as the flask shows. According to Vigo, the geometric


layout of the decoration and its eight- pointed starburst motif on the flask are drawn from Mamluk and Timurid metalwork and lustreware. Te author says, ‘Tese foreign clues were cleverly incorporated into traditional Chinese emblems and flower scroll bands. Te flask’s shape on the other hand goes back to Near Eastern Middle Bronze age pottery vessels mimicking animal- skin gourdes. It also uncannily recalls military canteen and the unglazed pilgrim flasks used in western and central Asia, after the advent of Islam. Some of these flasks were also associated with the collection of holy water from the well of Zamzam within the Masjid al-Haram, Mecca’. Regardless of where exactly it was MAO’s


produced, unglazed


earthenware flask provides an indirect inspiration for the porcelain Yongle- period flask. Unglazed flasks such as this were portable objects, used for the transportation of cool water on long journeys, during the 13th and 14th centuries, from Syria to Uzbekistan. Quite common and mass-produced, this distinctive shape made its way to Europe during the Crusades. Investigating the migration of ideas,


forms, techniques and symbols in an open, inclusive dialogue, the exhibition highlights the osmotic reciprocity between continents and seas, and creates new narratives for visual and material culture that are specific and relative rather than universalising and generic. Tis scientific approach also reflects the sensory perception of materiality: the way these objects were perceived and desired for their visual allure and unique chromatic effects gold and blue in particular – or for their reflecting, gleaming or transparent surfaces. Tis unusual approach to explore the vast ocean of cross- cultural influences, geopolitics, the dynamics of trade and migration of ideas allows the visitor to ponder the ancient conundrum of cultures and borders – something which is just as relevant today.


• Until 1 September, 2024, MAO Museo d’Arte Orientale, Turin,


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