Chinese Art-Asian Antiques News This Week

Bidamount News January 30, 2026, Vol 617

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Understanding Chinese export ceramics through Western paintings and prints

By William R. Sargent

Abstract

Scholars have long turned to traditional sources when researching Chinese export porcelain: The porcelain itself, extant historic collections, archaeological evidence, and primary documents. Occasionally they include a painting to show an example of their subject. There have been a few efforts to record such paintings, but no one has fully explored the numbers of extant paintings to examine how they reflect changes in the appreciation and socio-economic impact of Chinese porcelain in the West over time. Paintings and prints are a rich resource of information, they help to identify the market and use of forms, while lending credence to dating. They are also a record of lost tastes in collecting and display that cannot be recreated by paper records such as shipping documents, estate inventories, auction records, or diaries. This is a look at visual records through which we might track the impact of export porcelain on Western culture, one that reflects changes of taste, interior design, display and collecting habits.

Paintings and prints are a rich resource of information, help to identify the market and use of forms, while lending credence to dating. They are also a record of lost tastes in collecting and display that cannot be recreated by paper records such as shipping documents, estate inventories, auction records, or diaries. This article is a look at a few of those visual records through which we might track the impact of export porcelain on Western culture, one that reflects changes of taste, interior design, display and collecting habits.

Chinese and other Eastern paintings

First, we need to acknowledge that some porcelains considered within the context of the export market were not initially made for export. They can be included in Chinese paintings in the context of usage within China, such as an elephant candlestick in a portrait of the Qianlong emperor, or the Dehua censor used as a butter dish in Europe (Fig. 1) seen in a portrait by Lamqua over the right shoulder of the Hong merchant Wu Bingjian (1769–1843), known as Howqua to Western merchants (Fig. 2).

Chinese export porcelains appear in Chinese gouache paintings made for the export market including one from a series of views of porcelain production which depicts a potter creating a crab-shaped object similar to a crab tureen also used as a butter dish in Europe (Fig. 3).

Chinese porcelains also appear in Safavid, Persian, and Mughal paintings such as in the Samarkand or Tabriz album of the fifteenth century in the Topkapi Saray Museum (H.2153) which depicts a cart with large blue-and-white porcelain vessels [3]. A discussion on the appearance of porcelain must be confined in some manner, so the focus here is on European and North American works of art. The survey ends in the early twentieth century, in part to put parameters on the discussion, but recognizing that the presence of Chinese export porcelain continues to play a role in photography, theater, interior design, contemporary art, movies, and many other modes of art.

Treasures and allegories

Chinese porcelain arrived on the European stage steeped in mythologies, which made it appropriate for associations with gods: pagan or monotheistic [4]. At this early stage, the production of porcelain was a mystery around which mythologies were constructed, imbuing each piece with a reflected aura of its magical properties.

Chinese ceramics of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries were rare acquisitions outside China, destined for royal households throughout Asia and Europe. These earliest blue-and-white or celadon wares would become the collecting focus of Islamic and Byzantine rulers, porcelains that would fill the niches and shelves of the Topkapi Saray and the Ardebil Shrine [5], [6], [7]. A few examples reached Europe at the time, such as the vessel now known as the Gaignieres-Fonthill Vase, a celadon vase c. 1300–1340 [8]. A 1713 documentary watercolor of the vase with its now-lost mounts is a clear indication of the importance placed on such rarities [9]. These early porcelains were considered so precious that they were often mounted in elaborate silver or silver-gilt mounts and occasionally studded with gemstones, changing their functions with these modifications to suit European needs.

But what were porcelains made for and how were they ultimately used? The small bowl seen in Benaglio’s Madonna and Child (Fig. 4) is commonly known as a jixin wan chicken-heart bowl, or lianzi wan lotus-seed bowl. It was available in three sizes, with the smallest used as a tea vessel in China. By the time the bowl reached Europe it had lost its original purpose but retained an exoticism that was used, filled with pears, for religious purposes in that painting. The pear was a symbol recognized by contemporary viewers as representative of the Virgin Mary and Christ Child.

Most religious or mythological paintings of this early period were commissioned by royal households or churches, which would have owned Chinese porcelains. It would be a short step from a precious object in those collections to its incorporation in an important painting commissioned by the collector or church. One of the most well-known early paintings to include Chinese porcelain is the collaborative work by Bellini and Titian, The Feast of the Gods (Fig. 5), in which three large Chinese porcelain chargers are depicted.

Giovanni Agostino da Lodi’s Christ Washing the Feet of the Apostles, of about 1500, shows Christ using a large Chinese bowl for the most humble of religious practices (Fig. 6). The Chinese bowl is typical of large serving bowls such as a Hongwu (1368–98) example in the British Museum (Fig. 7).

The religious properties associated with Chinese porcelain are reflected in one of a series of paintings by Andre Reinoso (active 1610–1650) on the life of St. Francis Xavier. One is titled, ‘St. Francis Xavier relieves the thirst of his traveling companions’ [10]. In the center Francis hovers above the water, a miraculous, saintly action while a large Ming vase (referred to as a martaban, and possibly Shiwan ware) [11] is filled with salt water and lifted out of the sea. The salt water has been turned into potable water by Francis, while small Chinese bowls (kraak porcelain commonly called a crow cup for the depiction of a bird on the interior well) are used to quench the thirst of sailors and revive them. Porcelain had become part of the miraculous transformation.

Symbols of abundance

The collecting of porcelains by royals and the competition between them inspired the rising merchant class of the seventeenth century to compete in the acquisition of porcelain. The accumulation of larger numbers of porcelain was made possible by the now well-established sea routes which brought shiploads of porcelain and other Asian goods to Europe. This led merchant classes to collect and display this Chinese luxury as emblematic of their wealth and status. To record such prosperity, and in order to multiply the impact of their efforts to be acknowledged as having taken their place in society, they commissioned paintings by artists such as Osais Beert the Elder (Fig. 8) which focused on multiple porcelains as symbols of abundance and wealth. Clara Peeters created a still life that spoke to the abundance of foods available to the upper classes of Amsterdam: The crab, shrimp and lobster, as well as other foods are displayed, appropriately, on six kraak ware dishes of the seventeenth century, adding to the impression of affluence (Fig. 9).

Some saw the indulgence in luxury as an affront to godliness. One Dutch artist responded with a scene symbolic of over-indulgence.¹ Nature, represented by a deer, has disrupted the luxurious living of those who have lost their spiritual center and smashed their Chinese porcelain and gilded silver on the floor.

Collecting and display

Amassing porcelain and collecting porcelain are two different things. The first is interior design and the other is a serious study of the material. Augustus the Strong (1670–1733), Elector of Saxony and King of Poland, is among the most well-known collectors of the late seventeenth and early eighteenth century because of the scale of his collection, the survival of so many original pieces, and the scholarship now supporting it.

An unknown Flemish or Dutch artist portrayed a bedchamber in a rich burgher’s house which shows the shelf often found in homes of the period where merchants could show off their version of the more elaborate displays in grander homes and castles.² Installations in homes changed with time and fashion but are recorded in many paintings of interiors, and can also be seen in dollhouses such as one owned by Cornelia van der Gon (1644–1701) from the 1680s.³

Ship captains and naval officers who journeyed to Asia were justly proud of their professional accomplishments and the objects they collected which illustrated to the world their position on the social stage. A watercolor by W. Huddon of about 1800 depicts a proud officer with a map of Asia and some of his collections gathered around him [12], including two unfired nodding head clay figures under glass domes similar to an example (Fig. 10) once owned by Rev. William Bentley of Salem, MA, and recorded by him in his diary in 1790.

Baron Besenval (1722–1794) had been the commander-in-chief of France’s Swiss Guards at the outset of the French Revolution and became a well-known art collector. Some of his paintings and ceramics are seen in his portrait (Fig. 11). He seems to be thinking of his glory days as a soldier and collector, both part of history by the time the portrait was painted in 1791. On the mantle can be seen several Chinese celadon porcelains mounted in ormolu and behind him are Japanese porcelains.

Chinese porcelain all but disappeared in paintings of nineteenth century interiors. By the late eighteenth century the fashion for Asian arts had been replaced by Greek and Roman art, and other souvenirs of the Grand Tour. Collecting Chinese porcelain never ceased, but the nineteenth century was a time when such porcelain fell out of favor if looking at paintings is evidence. Porcelains were no longer displayed on shelves, mantles, or side tables, but were now piled high in corner cabinets. John Everett Millais painted one of many interior views of the nineteenth century with corner cupboards filled with unfashionable ceramics.⁴

Drinking and dining

Tea, coffee, chocolate, and punch were four drinks introduced to the West through trade with Asia and the Americas. Books have been written on each beverage but paintings provide us with another avenue to understand their adaption, popularity, and the status they conveyed.

Tea was the most pervasive and popular drink and provides us with the most complete visual record of its use in still-life paintings and in scenes of daily life. A family portrait in an interior setting, a ‘conversation piece’, was the perfect venue to display one’s wealth and manners. The portrait of Jonathan Tyers and his family is one such painting (Fig. 12). The daughter, being taught to be the consummate hostess, pours tea out of a Yixing teapot into Chinese porcelain cups. The same teapot has been found in a shipwreck of the period [13]. Aside from the highest levels of English society, the important custom of tea drinking had its place even in the vernacular culture and art of America, as did recognizing the value and rarity of the Chinese Imari tea bowl held by the young subject.⁵

Chocolate from the Americas was an exotic drink that found favor first among the wealthier classes of Europe. Since chocolate was from New Spain it stands to reason that its popularity in Europe would be reflected in Spanish paintings such as those by Francisco de Zurbarán (1598–1664) and Luis Meléndez (1716–1780). Jean-Baptiste Charpentier the Elder depicted a French duke’s family in the midst of a relaxing time around a table of hot chocolate (Fig. 13). Until the nineteenth century, chocolate was too expensive for the majority of citizens, as were the Chinese cups out of which they drank.

Beer had been one of the favorite alcoholic drinks before the arrival of punch and it never lost its foothold in certain segments of society. The only painting that the current author have found depicting a Chinese export porcelain tankard is by the French artist Nicolas de Largillière and is dated 1690.⁶

Punch, a drink brought from India, became a primary alcoholic beverage for ship captains, sailors, and gentlemen in Asia, Europe, and America. A portrait of Sir Bourchier Wrey by George Knapton speaks volumes about the use of Chinese porcelain punch bowls (and sugar bowls) on board ship, and the value of porcelain and punch as the captain struggled to keep from losing both on a lurching ship [14].⁷

Porcelains as props

Porcelain has not only been relegated to a side prop in a still life by Jan van Os (1744–1808) but the original blue and white punch bowl has also suffered the indignation of having had further decoration added in Europe after the fashion for its original design had passed.⁸

Even if one did not collect on a royal scale, a single piece might be still be treasured. Whether Ann Phillips, the subject of a portrait by the American artist Joseph Blackburn (Fig. 14), owned only the one vase she holds or had more is not known. But the graceful form and the elegant colors were reasons enough for the artist, or subject, to include the vase as a prop.

One of the most famous American paintings which includes Chinese porcelains as props is James Abbott McNeil Whistler’s Purple and Rose of 1864 (Fig. 15), a portrait of a model in a Chinese robe and surrounded by Chinese blue-and-white porcelains from the artist’s own collection.

William McGregor Paxton (1869–1941) may have been the most prolific American painter using Asian material as props in the early 1900s. A lecture could be given only on his work and his fascination with Chinese and Japanese textiles, bronzes, and ceramics. One example is a portrait of a house maid (Fig. 16) who has paused in her dusting to examine a book. On the table next to her is a grouping of Asian decorative arts.

Chinese export porcelain continued, and continues, to be an integral part of Western life. Volumes on interior design of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries recorded their consistent appearance in the lives of collectors large and small. Contemporary artists use porcelain shards in their art and play off the histories of porcelain which are ripe with contemporary concerns. Chinese export porcelains even appear in movies: An eighteenth- century Guanyin became a prop in the 1954 movie Dial M for Murder, while a mid-eighteenth century Chinese plate can be seen on the wall in the BBC production of Christopher and His Kind.⁹ Did the set designers know what they were using as props? I doubt it. In David Howard’s autobiography, he records presenting a tureen with the arms of the city of Cork to the Mayor. The tureen had been part of a service consigned to Heirloom & Howard by a film property company after it had been used in a James Bond film [15].

We may not have collectors any longer of the caliber of Augustus the Strong but there are many contemporary collectors who share his passion for Chinese export porcelain, such as the late Álvaro Conde Díaz-Rubín (d. 2018) of Mexico City (Fig. 17), whose collection was not recorded in paintings but in a publication with photographs [16]. Chinese export porcelain may have lost its standing as an allegorical or religious object, as a treasure worthy of mounting in gold and gemstones, or a subject worthy of painting, but the lure of Chinese export porcelain endures in ever changing ways.

Fig. 17. Collection of Alvaro Conde, 2014, from William R. Sargent, Chinese Porcelain in the Conde Collection, Ediciones El Viso, Mexico City, 2014, photograph by Bernardo Aja.

Hand Made and Handheld..Exhibit and Catalog

The catalog of the pieces for the above exhibit can be seen in this catalog. Made available through Arts Of Asia magazine. CLICK HERE TO ORDER

Note: I have already bought this catalog, it is a very good reference on the topic, an essential I think if you are a collector. Best Peter

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