A Spotlight Loan A Ming Emperor’s seat

10 August to 21 November 2021

Acknowledgements The British Museum’s National Programme highlights key objects in its collection. It is one of the many ways the Museum collaborates with organisations across the UK. Through this programme and other touring exhibitions and loans, more people see British Museum objects outside London than visit the museum itself – over 10 million people had the chance to see more than 2,800 objects on loan during 2019/20.

The British Museum is proud to be working in partnership with the Royal Albert Memorial Museum on A Ming Emperor’s Seat.

The Ming seat is part of a long-term loan from the Sir Percival David Collection to the British Museum. It has almost 1,700 examples of the finest in the world, primarily dating from the Song, Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties, spanning 1,000 years.

This Spotlight Loan is supported by The Sir Percival David Foundation of .

This exhibition has been made possible as a result of the Government Indemnity Scheme. The Royal Albert Memorial Museum & Art Gallery would like to thank HM Government for providing Government Indemnity and the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport and Arts Council England for arranging the indemnity.

A Ming Emperor’s seat Porcelain with underglaze cobalt-blue decoration Jingdezhen, Jiangxi province 江西省, 景德鎮 Ming dynasty, Wanli period, AD 1573–1620 On loan from the Sir Percival David Foundation of Chinese Art, PDF,B.660

This garden seat was made for the court of the Wanli Emperor (r.1573–1620). His reign was one of the longest in the Ming dynasty. It was crafted in the kiln site of Jingdezhen, the porcelain capital of China for over a thousand years. The large hollow seat would have been used by members of the emperor’s enormous household. It would have been moved from the palace interior to the surrounding gardens.

The seat features blue dragons surrounded by clouds, waves and a flaming pearl. Dense patterns of leaves and flowers ornament the sides which are pierced with intricate rings. The use of a dragon is significant because in China the dragon motif represented Imperial authority. It was also used as a shorthand symbol for the emperor himself.

Sir Percival David (1892 - 1964) A passionate collector or ceramics

Sir Percival David built the finest private collection of Chinese ceramics in the world. He came from the wealthy Sassoon banking family, based in Bombay (now Mumbai), India, and settled in London in 1913. His passion for China inspired him to learn Chinese well enough to translate 14th-century art texts. His business took him across East Asia where he purchased many of his best ceramics.

David was a committed philanthropist and gave money towards establishing the first public display of Chinese ceramics at the Palace Museum in Beijing. He was determined to use his own collection to inform and inspire people and to keep it on public view in its entirety. Today the Sir Percival David Foundation Trustees continue his mission by lending the collection to the British Museum and allowing this rare item to travel around the UK for the first time.

Image caption: Sir Percival David Credit: © SOAS Picture Archive, SOAS/SPA/4/8 © SOAS

A Love of Porcelain Chinese porcelain was exported to Southeast Asia, the Middle East and Africa in the Tang dynasty (AD 618-906). European traders imported porcelain directly from China in the early 1500s. By the 1700s, trade was restricted to Guangzhou (Canton). Trading stations built in European styles called Hongs flanked the Pearl River in Canton. There, European traders lived during the trading season and also stored porcelain for shipment abroad.

Porcelain was a popular commodity as it could not be made in Europe at the time and commanded high prices there. The European demand for tea dominated the 18th-century trade with China. Porcelain in underglaze blue and white was often used as ship ballast.

RAMM’s collections include an assortment of export-ware produced in the Ming and Qing dynasties. Visitors exploring the Asia display in the adjacent gallery will find a small selection of porcelain there.

Image caption: Finished porcelain is being loaded onto a boat for the journey to places like the Hongs at Guangzhou (Canton). Credit: © The Trustees of the British Museum

How it was made The excellence of Chinese ceramics is the result of an efficient organisation which existed in all manufacturing industries, but especially in the ceramic industry. During the Ming dynasty, kilns at Jingdezhen produced sufficient porcelain to supply the whole country and much of the rest of the world as well. They used methods of mass-production.

The different tasks, such as preparing the material, forming and decorating the pieces, were subdivided among a number of different craftsmen. Many workers were involved at each stage in the processes of porcelain-making. A single item might pass through the hands of as many as seventy men.

Creating a form in clay without resulting in major cracks or sagging was extremely hard to achieve. Porcelain is a ceramic ware constituted of two ingredients, kaolin and petuntse. Petuntse is a feldspathic rock also called china stone, a mineral formed from decomposed granite.

After firing at a very high temperature these combined ingredients enabled potters to create a delicate, translucent, non-porous strong body. This garden seat, for example, can support the weight of an adult person without breaking.

Image caption: Porcelain vessels being loaded into the kilns prior to firing. Credit: © The Trustees of the British Museum