Liling is rich in ceramics, firecrackers and fireworks, and has the reputation of "porcelain capital" and "hometown of fireworks". It is the world-famous producer of underglaze colored porcelain. Porcelain is one of China's original inventions, and it is still called "China" in English. Liling ceramics production has a history of nearly two thousand years. As early as the Eastern Han Dynasty, Liling had a large-scale workshop, specializing in pottery production. In the seventh year of Yongzheng in Qing Dynasty (1729), Liling began to burn coarse porcelain. Liling porcelain industry entered a new development period in the late Qing Dynasty and early Republic of China. Liling is an ancient and modern city in the south of the Yangtze River. It enjoys the reputation of "porcelain capital" and is the origin of world-famous underglaze colored porcelain. Porcelain is one of China's original inventions, and it is still called "China" in English. Liling ceramics production has a history of nearly two thousand years. As early as the Eastern Han Dynasty, Liling had a large-scale workshop, specializing in pottery production. In the seventh year of Yongzheng in Qing Dynasty (1729), Liling began to burn coarse porcelain. Liling porcelain industry entered a new development period in the late Qing Dynasty and early Republic of China.
In the long history, many people with lofty ideals and skilled craftsmen have made great contributions to the development of Liling porcelain industry. 1904, Xiong Xiling, a native of Fenghuang, Hunan Province (who was the Prime Minister of Beiyang Government after the Revolution of 1911) and Wen Jun Duo, a juren from Liling who had participated in the "writing on the bus", went to Japan for inspection in line with the idea of saving the country through industry. During their stay in Japan, they found that Japanese porcelain industry has advanced technology and excellent products. After returning to China the following year, accompanied by Wen Junduo, Xiong Xiling visited the main producing areas of coarse porcelain in Liling, and found out the main reasons for the backward production of Liling porcelain industry. At the same time, he saw the favorable conditions for Liling to further develop porcelain production: a broad consumer market, rich porcelain clay resources and low labor prices. Immediately put forward the idea of "establishing schools and companies", which was strongly supported by the Hunan government. At that time, Hunan Official Porcelain School was officially opened in Liling. The following year, Hunan Porcelain Manufacturing Company was established in Liling, with Xiong Xiling as the general manager and Wen Junduo as the school supervisor. The company hired Japanese technicians and Jingdezhen skilled workers to introduce the most advanced production technology and equipment in Japan at that time, which opened a new era of Liling from coarse porcelain production to fine porcelain development. Liling's unique underglaze porcelain was developed under this background.
Previously, Liling porcelain used a single cobalt oxide (commonly known as soil ink) as raw material for color decoration. After the rough flower pattern is hand-painted, it is glazed and fired into underglaze blue-and-white porcelain. From 1907 to 1908, Hunan Institute of Porcelain developed a variety of underglaze pigments, such as grass green, navy blue, bright black, ochre and agate red. Famous painters of Hunan Porcelain Company and graduates of ceramic classes of porcelain school have repeatedly developed and produced refreshing colorful underglaze porcelain by using self-made underglaze pigments, double hooks filled with water and "three-firing" method of Chinese painting. Under-glaze multicolored porcelain is exquisite in porcelain quality, exquisite in painting, fresh and elegant, unique in style, colorful under glaze, showing vivid pictures, which has high artistic value and use value. Its appearance immediately aroused great concern and praise from people in the industry and public opinion at home and abroad. From 1909 to 19 1 1, Liling underglaze multicolored porcelain participated in Wuhan Persuasion Association, Nanyang Persuasion Association and Dulang International Competition respectively, and won gold medals in succession. Liling porcelain began to make a name for itself in China and went to the world. "White as jade, bright as a mirror, thin as paper and loud as a chime" was a good evaluation of Liling porcelain at that time.
19 15, Liling porcelain crossed the ocean and participated in the Panama Pacific World Expo held in San Francisco, USA. The underglaze colored lentil and bird porcelain bottle and Kweichow Moutai won the highest honor, winning back two gold medals for China. The lentil and bird porcelain bottle is a classic work of Hunan Porcelain Company 19 1 1 year. The bottle is 46.8 cm high and 20 cm in diameter, white as jade, shaped like a phoenix tail, with smooth lines, crystal glaze, calm and elegant colors, vivid and natural color composition and exquisite craftsmanship, which is amazing and praised by foreign public opinion as "the peak of oriental ceramic art". Since then, Liling porcelain has enjoyed a world-renowned reputation, with an endless stream of buyers, and a number of private fine porcelain manufacturing companies have been built one after another. At that time, the grand occasion kept pace with Jingdezhen, and underglaze colored porcelain became a major feature of China ceramics, which was also a world-wide initiative.
After a short development of one or two decades, the production of underglaze multicolored porcelain began to decline in the late 1920s and was affected by many wars. Many porcelain factories in Liling 100 stopped production, and Hunan Porcelain Company, which was the first to produce underglaze colored porcelain, closed down on 1930, and the production of underglaze colored porcelain was interrupted.
From 65438 to 0949, Liling was peacefully liberated, and the dying Liling porcelain industry was like a dead tree in spring. In the following years, Liling porcelain industry quickly recovered and made great progress. 1954, in order to resume the production of underglaze colored porcelain, which was interrupted for more than 20 years, after repeated searching by relevant departments, Wu Shouqi, the first graduate of the original pottery painting class of Hunan Ceramic Industry School, was found. At this time, Wu was nearly old and was enjoying his old age in the countryside. After Wu Lao came out of the mountain, while training underglaze painters, he reformed the traditional craft, changing "three firing" into two firing, and the production of underglaze colorful porcelain was restored in a short time. Since then, Hunan Ceramic Research Institute and Liling Porcelain Company Art Porcelain Factory (Li Qun Porcelain Factory) have been established one after another, becoming specialized research and production units of underglaze decoration. During this period, Liling porcelain industry quickly realized the historic transformation from manual to mechanical, from wooden kiln to coal kiln. New materials, new technologies, new processes and new products emerge in an endless stream, and underglaze multicolored porcelain reappears brilliantly, even gaining the reputation of "national porcelain".
Liling's underglaze porcelain is not only beautiful and elegant, but also has the advantages of friction resistance, acid and alkali resistance, lead-free and non-toxic, and never fading. It is a real green product and enjoys a long-standing reputation at home and abroad. Since the 1960s, underglaze colored porcelain such as arts and crafts porcelain and high-grade daily-use porcelain produced in Liling have become the best-selling products in domestic and foreign markets. With the continuous expansion of production scale, Liling has gradually developed into one of the main production bases for exporting ceramics in China.
Liling underglaze multicolored porcelain is a new type of ceramics. The firing of Liling underglaze multicolored porcelain in the late Qing Dynasty and the early Republic of China lasted only 20 years. Due to the chaos of the times, the coverage of works is not wide, and fine works are scarce, but there are only more than 400 works handed down from generation to generation. There are only 7 pieces of Liling underglaze multicolored porcelain in the Palace Museum, and only 17 pieces in the Hunan Provincial Museum. Liling underglaze multicolored porcelain has unique artistic beauty. Modeling is full of changes and tends to be lively. General vase shapes are conventional, while Liling underglaze colored porcelain often perfectly combines traditional vase shapes with other foreign shapes; And there are absolutely no dazzling colors such as big red and purple, and there is a noble temperament in elegance. It has great cultural value, craftsmanship and appreciation.
The process of making underglaze colored porcelain is extremely complicated and difficult. First, the first-class high-quality porcelain clay is selected as the embryo, and before molding, the porcelain clay is precipitated, filtered and absorbed with iron to ensure that the porcelain clay is not doped with other impurities. The real molding requires the artist to polish the porcelain body very thin and smooth, and its technology depends entirely on the artist's hand feeling, and it takes more than ten years of production experience to be competent. Its color pigments come from glaze raw materials, rare earth and colored minerals, and some also contain precious metals such as gold, which is very precious. Because underglaze colored porcelain is painted directly on the blank, it is very demanding for painters to decorate pigments on the fetal glaze. Worship the kiln god before firing, because the painted porcelain tires have to be fired at a high temperature of about 1370 degrees Celsius. Because it is a one-time high-temperature firing, it is technically difficult to grasp, just like taking treasure from fire, and the yield is less than 70%. Even so, only a few porcelain factories can be fired at present. The successfully produced underglaze multicolored porcelain lines overflow the porcelain surface through the glaze, which is crystal clear and moist with high whiteness, transparency and glaze hardness. Under-glaze colored porcelain makes the patterns on porcelain visible, intangible and never fade, giving people a noisy and refreshing feeling, which makes porcelain reach; It is as thin as paper, as white as jade, as bright as a mirror and as loud as a chime. Moreover, it has the characteristics of high porcelain strength, strong vitrification of glaze, non-toxic lead and cadmium, acid and alkali resistance, wear resistance, colorfastness and durability. , which can meet people's dual requirements of beauty, environmental protection and health at the same time, and has high collection and use value.
Characteristics of underglaze multicolored porcelain in Liling;
First, lead-free poison, acid and alkali resistance, wear resistance, and never fade.
Second, colorful, strong but not vulgar, light and sacred.
Third, the picture is bright and smooth, elegant and bright, crystal clear and moist, and full of moisture.
Fourth, the decorative pattern is concise and the structural drawing is rigorous.
The works of Yi Wu, a famous contemporary artist in Liling, are treasured by Master Xingyun, president of the World Association of the International Buddha Light Society.
Liling is a famous contemporary underglaze colored porcelain art, appraised by experts of national senior arts and crafts artists, and a master of ceramic art in Hunan Province. Yi Wu Ceramic Art Collection published by Hunan Fine Arts Publishing House has been permanently collected by the National Library of China and kept by China Art Museum. The underglaze colored porcelain work "Lotus Rhyme" is permanently collected by China Arts and Crafts Museum; Taiwan Province Province, the president of the World Association of the International Buddha Light Society, and the internationally renowned master Xingyun collected two pieces of artistic porcelain works, Lotus Rhyme and Dutch Fun, which were permanently preserved in Foguangyuan Art Museum in Taiwan Province Province, making great contributions to promoting cross-strait cultural and artistic exchanges! Yi Wu has been engaged in the research and design of Liling underglaze colored porcelain for 20 years, and is good at various underglaze colored techniques. His works have unique visual aesthetic and artistic value. He won 17 awards in the national art exhibition, was included in 15 large-scale art album, and participated in more than 20 art exhibitions. Yi Wu's Liling underglaze porcelain has won geographical indications of Liling porcelain in People's Republic of China (PRC) and China, and her works have participated in ceramic exhibitions in Hongkong, Japan, Singapore and South Africa for many times. His works are magnificent in shape and simple in glaze color, showing the artistic effect of Liling underglaze colored porcelain, and are deeply treasured by collectors at home and abroad, the National Art Museum and the National Library.