Chrysanthemums are so beautiful and colorful. They don’t win by their delicate appearance, but they win by their elegance and steadfastness.
People love it for its delicate charm, and even more for its proud appearance that blooms alone in the frost and never falls in the west wind.
Chrysanthemums have always been favored by poets. The ancients especially liked to use flowers to represent themselves and to express their aspirations, as a metaphor for their noble sentiments and unyielding loyalty.
Because chrysanthemums have such a beautiful meaning, ancient people also used chrysanthemum patterns to make porcelain.
Among them, the most famous chrysanthemum vessel type is the chrysanthemum petal plate from the Yongzheng and Qianlong dynasties of the Qing Dynasty.
In particular, the twelve-color chrysanthemum petal plate made by Yongzheng Emperor was praised by later generations as a famous product for its exquisite shape, exquisite production and magnificent glaze color.
According to records, when this set of Yongzheng twelve single-color plates was researched and developed at the time, it can be said to be an ingenious and ingenious design.
After Yongzheng saw it, he immediately won his favor. Then he ordered the masters in Jingzhen to work together, and then produced a set of 40 sets of works in twelve colors for the palace.
Here is the key point. Even with the level of the royal masters of the official kilns in Jingzhen at that time, they still needed to work together to fire a complete set of twelve colors.
It is not that easy for Chen Wenzhe to perfectly copy this set of chrysanthemum petals.
Of course, it is not impossible, because the records of the forty sets of chrysanthemum petal disks were fortunately preserved.
However, it is unknown whether anyone fired it later or whether it was successful.
At this time, Chen Wenzhe felt a little emotional, not that the chrysanthemum petal plate was difficult to make, but that there were too many classic porcelains he wanted to make, right?
It was originally an imitation of Ruguan kiln porcelain, but I only imitated some Ru kiln flower cups, and then I thought of making pastel Zadao porcelain.
Originally, the pastel zadao porcelain was well made, but suddenly I thought of using carmine red glaze. After all, this is a classic glaze. As long as it is used, it can increase the quality of the porcelain and increase the value of the porcelain.
As for the pastel Zadao porcelain with carmine red glaze, I also thought of the chrysanthemum petal plate with carmine red glaze.
This time the porcelain is very classic, and Chen Wenzhe wants it all. Now that he has thought of it, he must make it, otherwise he will forget about it.
But, if you do this, will it be over?
However, the pink pastel chrysanthemum plate is really beautiful.
And with such a plate, wouldn’t the other twelve-color single-color glazed chrysanthemum petal plates be beautiful?
Thinking of those twelve plates, Chen Wenzhe's heart felt itchy!
At this time, he happened to have finished the work in hand, and Zhang Gu also produced several chrysanthemum petal plate utensil embryos.
It was just a matter of waiting to dry, so Chen Wenzhe simply helped Zhang’s buttocks to be trimmed.
To make a plate thin, it also needs to have a tight and solid texture, so the requirements for making clay are not low.
The tire clay here is all specially made and has already passed the standard. Now if you want it to be thin enough so that it can be smooth and translucent after applying the glaze, you must do the process of removing the embryo.
After Chen Wenzhe's hands, this piece of equipment has reached its ultimate perfection. No matter how thin it is, it will be as thin as paper.
After finishing the trimming of several pieces of wares, the next step is to directly apply the glaze.
The difficulty of making this type of plate lies entirely in the glaze color.
This set of twelve plates is definitely a classic from the Yongzheng period, because the entire process of making the chrysanthemum petal plates can be said to be quite ingenious and in line with Emperor Yongzheng's aesthetics.
Nian Xiyao, the pottery supervisor at that time, was a very smart man and knew very well what type of porcelain the emperor liked.
In particular, he chose 12 colors to be composed together, so any one of them can be said to please the emperor's heart.
Nian Xiyao, the governor of pottery, was the brother of General Nian Gengyao. He was exiled to the border area because his brother was convicted and implicated. On the way, he was captured by Emperor Yongzheng and brought back to burn porcelain.
As a guilty person, he has responsibilities. You can imagine how strong his sense of responsibility was for the porcelain at that time.
Therefore, it is natural that a series of high-quality products appear, and the craftsmanship of excellence is also as miraculous as the existence of miraculous craftsmanship.
Of these twelve plates, Chen Wenzhe can only make a few kinds now.
Of course, what he made must be an authentic imitation. As for the other things he couldn't do, it was mainly because he had never seen those single-color glazes, so naturally he didn't know how to mix a qualified glaze color.
The single-color glaze of Yongzheng porcelain is a classic, and the chrysanthemum petal plate in the single-color glaze is the pinnacle of it.
Yongzheng single-color glaze porcelain mainly has two parts, one is imitation Song Dynasty, including imitation Ru, imitation official glaze, imitation Ge glaze, imitation Jun glaze, etc.;
The other is colored glaze, and there are many chrysanthemum petal plates of this type.
Therefore, Chen Wenzhe wanted to make only one colored glaze, and the rest would be single-color glazes.
There are several types that are easier for him to make. In addition to white glaze, yellow glaze, and green glaze, the other better ones are definitely the coral red glaze chrysanthemum petal plate, and the other is the okra green glaze chrysanthemum petal plate.
Okra green glaze is not difficult to prepare, after all, Chen Wenzhe makes a lot of green glaze porcelain.
The celadon glaze porcelain can become green glaze with a slight change.
He now knows how to prepare a lot of green glazes. After all, he had previously made a green-glazed lotus leaf-style Taihu Qiucao cup, so naturally he has researched on green glazes.
But this time, the piece is much larger, with a height of 3.3 cm, a diameter of 17.5 cm, and a full diameter of 11.3 cm. This must be basically the same size as the one in the Forbidden City collection.
This piece belongs to the green color family, the exact name is okra green!
Yongzheng's single-color glaze porcelain is a color-separated system. Generally, literature records twelve colors, but each color has a different name according to its different shades.
For example, green includes green glaze, lake green, green and okra green.
The single-color glazed chrysanthemum petal plate is clearly recorded in the Qing palace archives, and there are detailed records in the "Cleaning Files of the Works of the Building Office of Yangxin Palace".
It not only records in detail how many pieces were fired, but also mainly what kind of plates they were.
The main reason why Chen Wenzhe wants to imitate such a set of plates is that it is too difficult to collect a set now.
Don't talk about one set, even collecting one piece is an unattainable luxury.
Even now, it is difficult for all museums and collectors to have the same size and gather twelve colors.
Chen Wenzhe knew that only the Forbidden City in the divine capital had managed to collect the twelve colors.
"Perhaps the set collected by the Forbidden City can be copied!"
Thinking of the collection in the Forbidden City, Chen Wenzhe felt that he could create them all, because he felt that some of the colors in them were not so classic.
It can also be said that the color of the Yongzheng twelve-color single-color glaze chrysanthemum petal dish in the National Palace Museum is not standard.
For example, green, if it is not okra green, but also other lotus leaf greens, can be made into a set, but it is not standard or orthodox.
If it was just a simple matter of gathering twelve colors, Chen Wenzhe would definitely be able to do it, and even said that he could easily gather twelve colors, but that is not necessary.
Some of them are easy to make. It turns out that the one he hasn't made yet must be yellow, and the second to last one is okra green.
White, red, green, yellow, and Chen Wenzhe can all be fired. For other colors, just try it out.
Legend has it that the twelve-color porcelain is the result of color testing.