Related stories

Ma Weidu's Collection: Furniture 2006 'Arts from Our Land' Competition China's Int'l Arts and Entertainment Group Founded Labyrinths Comics and Contemporary Visual Arts 'Meet in Beijing' Arts Festival

Ma Weidu's Collection: Chinaware

What’s the most expensive chinaware in the world? An old pot of china was auctioned in London for what is equivalent to 230 million yuan in July 2005, setting a new record for a single porcelain piece. The round-shaped pot is 27.5 centimetres tall, 33 centimetres wide, and weighs about 20 jin, or 10 kilograms: not at all big or heavy enough to be worth 2 tons of gold. Then why is it so valuable? People can’t help wondering.

 “One reason is that it’s from the Yuan Dynasty (1271–1368),” answers Ma Weidu in his new book Ma Weidu’s Collection: Chinaware (in two volumes). Ma, a famous Chinese antique collector, is now hosting a popular TV programme on CCTV, sharing his experience in antique collecting with his audience. The programme was such a success that the texts of his lectures were compiled to make books, mainly about classical Chinese furniture and chinaware.

According to Ma, the Yuan Dynasty was the starting point of a new kind of chinaware: Qinghua Ci, or the blue and white porcelain. After Genghis Khan and his Mongolian knights conquered East and Central Asia, they brought back the colour blue from the Arabians and gave it to Chinese workers. The rich blue colour was then carefully mixed and hand painted on the surfaces of porcelain pieces. New techniques were developed to ensure the colour did not fade. After generations of hard work and extensive experiments, Qinghua Ci finally became the flagship product of the traditional China ceramic industry: Jingdezhen porcelain, named after Jingdezhen, the place where it was created, which is known as “China’s porcelain capital.”

Ma, 53, began his collection in the 1980s. At that time, many people in China were more focused on buying TVs and refrigerators, and replacing old fashioned porcelain with modern plastics. Ma, however, quietly spent his money collecting old items. “In the past, these antiques did not have such high economic value,” said Ma, “but it’s different now.” The first items he collected were a pair of porcelain hanging panels, which cost him 1,600 yuan; they are worth much more today.

Ma Weidu’s Collection: Chinaware, Volumes 1 and 2（《马未都说收藏：陶瓷篇（上）》）

By Ma Weidu（马未都）

Zhonghua Book Company (中华书局)