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An artifact with a cobalt blue colored image covered by a layer of transparent glaze on a plain ceramic body, fired at a high temperature, is known as blue and white porcelain. It is a style of great significance and influential power in the history of ceramics; it also represents a form of imagery that is unique to Asia.

The blue and white porcelain of China is regarded as Asia’s most enduring and exquisite art. Yet, West Asia, Southeast Asia, and Northeast Asia also have their own traditions of making blue and white. In mutual exchange and interaction, the blue and white wares manufactured in each place would often be brought together in a single collection. Sometimes they are even unearthed together from an archaeological site, revealing how artisans and craftsmen learned from one another and competed with one another, and how each porcelain making technique and form or decorative style varied but was nevertheless linked to each other.

The Asia that we see in blue and white porcelain is one carrying vestiges not only of a fluidity of commodities, but also of a dissemination of firing techniques and of a mobility of potters, characteristics held in common by all parts of Asia: a moving aesthetic in which the blue and white are set off against each other.

China: Another Name for Porcelain

In the mid-14^th century, China began large-scale production of blue and white porcelain at Ching-te-chen, which went on to become an important type among those produced by official and private kilns during the Ming and Ch’ing dynasties, supplied for the use of the inner court, as well as for everyday purposes and for the bestowal of gifts on foreign states. To meet the requirements of the European and Asian markets, Chinese blue and white porcelains often presented forms or ornamentation in response to specific demands.

Northeast Asia: Transmission and Innovation

Blue and white porcelains around the beginning of the 15^th century entered the Korean peninsula and began to be manufactured there in the latter half of that century. At the end of the 16^th century Japan went to war with Korea, and brought back skillful potters, and, in the early 17^th century, the area of Hizen in Kyushu began production of blue and white porcelains, which then became a major trading commodity. The two countries mainly copied Chinese styles initially, but gradually developed blue and white porcelains with their own individual characteristics.

Southeast Asia: Markets of Competition

The period between the 15^th and the 16^th centuries was a brief golden age in Southeast Asian blue and white porcelains. It was Vietnam that first imitated China in producing blue and white. And since the late 15^th century, through the maritime trade, Vietnamese porcelains began to occupy a major and illustrious position in the Asia market. Thailand, though it had no tradition of blue and white, produced large quantities of underglaze iron-painted ceramics with patterns resembling those of blue and white. Such wares were widely popular.

West Asia: the Spread of a Blue and White Aesthetic

From the 8^th century onwards, the decorative form of blue and white pottery of West Asia influenced all parts of Asia, and the hard, refined blue and white porcelains from other parts of the continent were much loved in Western Asia. The shape of the Chinese oil lamp featured in the exhibition is reminiscent of those of the magic lamps of Islamic stories; the Arab calligraphic designs in Chinese objects are fashionable Western Asian decorations. Although the West Asian style was influential, from the 16^th century onwards, it began to be affected by Chinese style of decoration.