PRINCIPLES OF COLLECTING ASIAN CERAMICS:

Don’t Buy Ceramics 

in China 

 
It seems perfectly intuitive that the best place to acquire ancient Chinese Ceramic Art (Porcelain, Stoneware and Earthenware) is in China where it was originally produced. 
 
If tiny empires like ancient Greece existing for only a few centuries produced enough artefacts to fill museums of the west, then the massive Chinese empire must have produced gargantuan quantities of art objects over its thousands of years of existence. And it was Ceramic Art that China was considered pre-eminent in all the world. Such was the dominance in past centuries that even today the word “china” is used interchangeably as porcelain. Given the remarkable history of achievement, ancient Ceramic works of art must be laying around all over China for anyone to just pick up off the ground!
 
Unfortunately, that is not the case. Like most countries that produced great works of art in ancient times, later generations did not always look after it until there was very little left. In China, there were 2 great upheavals that caused the great nation to lose most of its ancient Ceramic Art treasures. 
 
The most catastrophic of these is thought to be the Cultural Revolution launched by Chairman Mao Zedong in the mid-1960’s. During the tumultuous period, millions of ancient art objects were smashed to bits by fanatical young proletariats in their drive to demolish sinister counter-revolutionary values. It was an incalculable loss to China and to our species as a whole. 
 
Chinese art also suffered a lot of abuse due to invasions and related bad behaviour of foreign powers. The western countries in particular were the cause of much shameful damage to and theft from the great country’s wealth in art objects. Thankfully, the objects extracted were revered by these foreigners and some of the finest Chinese Ceramics Art collections in Europe were founded upon these acquired artefacts. 
 
Perhaps the greatest art theft from Chinese territory was accomplished by Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalist Army near the end of the Chinese civil war. When it became clear that the communists would win the mainland, the bulk of the Chinese palace museum collection was evacuated to Taiwan. It has been said ever since that Chiang Kai-shek “lost the country but got the best stuff.” Today, the National Palace Museum in Taipei is the curator of this invaluable collection of 650,000 works art comprising 8,000 years of Chinese history. 
 
For these reasons and others, China does not have much in the way of Chinese works of ancient art. A public example of this unfortunate situation is the Ceramics collection of Palace Museum in Beijing.  Considered the country’s greatest, it is disappointing in both quantity and quality. 
 
Given the scarcity, the Chinese government now understandably forbids the export of ancient artefacts of almost all sorts. Collectors who attempt to acquire authentic pieces do a great disservice to the nation of China and take a lot of risk for themselves. On the other hand, the export of replica Ceramic Art (otherwise known as fakes for which China is the world's greatest producer) seems greatly encouraged by the Chinese government. 
 
The items that are available for sale from dealers in China are of doubtful repute and almost certainly fakes. 

Go to the

Chalre 

Collection

of Asian Ceramic Art