Ginger jar
Category
Ceramics
Date
1650 - 1665
Materials
paint & porcelain
Measurements
390 mm (Height); 190 mm (Diameter)
Order this imageCollection
Kedleston Hall, Derbyshire
NT 108557.2.1
Summary
Jar with cover, one of a pair, porcelain, baluster-shaped, cobalt blue painted under the glaze with polychrome enamels painted over the glaze, a technique known in China as wucai ("five colours") with an imperial concubine entertained by a dancer, whose hand movements are accentuated by long sleeves, a fashion introduced at the Tang court, accompanied by an all female wind and percussion ensemble. The five musicians are playing cymbals, a sheng (a mouth organ with multiple pipes), a drum on stand, a guban (bamboo clapper of two sticks joined with rope) and a dizi (bamboo flute). A similar ensemble appears in a woodblock-printed illustration in the Yuanyuantiao, c. 1650 (Zhou Wu, Hongguo guben xiqu chatuxuan, Tianjin, 1984, p. 288), China, JIngdezhen, Early Qing dynasty, Shunzhi period, c. 1650-1665. Patricia Ferguson 2015
Provenance
On loan from the Curzon family. Purchased by the National Trust from the Hon. James Curzon in March 2008.