| Descriptions： | The world, to a great extent, is coming to know China through the
chinaware it produced, and the country`s porcelain was virtually
used as a yardstick in evaluating Chinese civilization. Without the
invention and development of fine porcelain, China`s history would
have been decidedly different.
The 1,000-year-old Ruyao kiln was largely discovered in Qingliangsi
village of Baofeng County, the largest celadon production site
during the Song Dynasty(960-1279). Ru Kiln refers to a official
kiln in Baofeng County catering to the Northern Song rulers; the
kiln`s products were known as Ru ware porcelain. Throughout China`s
history, celadon pieces made at Ruyao kiln were sent as tribute to
the imperial court.
The Northern Song rulers, considering the white porcelain vessels
of Dingzhou unsuitable for use because of their rough mouth-rims,
sent personnel to establish kilns in Ruzhou to manufacture celadon.
In the eyes of the people of the Song Dynasty, the celadon of Ru
ware ranked first in quality among all northern celadon ware.
The Ru kilns supported the vessels with studs (thin pieces of
material used for supporting objects) during firing so that their
mouth-rims and even their foot-rims were entirely covered with a
layer of smooth vitreous (glasslike) glaze. Ru ware porcelain had a
thick lustrous green glaze with a sapphire-like blue tinge. The
vessels had fine crackles (decoration patterns of very small
surface cracks) over the entire surface, very unique.
Ru Kiln had been listed on the top five famouse Chinese kilns (Ru,
Jun, Guan, Ge, Ding) in Song dynasty which had been praised as `the
ringleader of celadon`. Ru kiln is in the first position among all
porcelain with exquisite base, stiff structure and glossy glaze
color. Starting from Song, Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasty, Ru kiln has
been used in royal court and kept as treasure. The firing
techniques of Ru kiln are very complicated. The base is made with
more than 10 kinds of mines after being shattered. It is being
filtered by tambours of 80 meshes and 120 meshes, sucked all the
irons by magneticte and tagged into slop, the slop is then being
put into mold. After being dried throughly, the base has to be
polished three times to make it smooth. After that, the product is
to be fired at the temperature of 800°C for 10 hours and polished
for two times again. The worker will put glaze on the base and fire
it for another 13 hours. There are 18 steps to make a finished
product. The key procedure of firing is the oxidation reduction
under 1260°C which get rid of oxygen atom from silicate. The rate
of finished product is just 17%, as for the excellent products,
there are even fewer.
Ru kiln ware is soft and smooth. When using it, you can use a tea
pot brush to moisten the surface by tea liquor. You may then
appreciate the changing of veins on the Ru kiln ware. The Ru kiln
ware shall not be kept without being used for long time. You can
only fell its soul while using.
|
