Porcelain & China

Blanc de Chine Figure

This Blanc de Chine figure likely depicts the Taoist immortal, Magu. She is often shown as a beautiful young woman, adorned with flowers, holding a ewer containing the elixir of life in hands with long, delicate fingernails, and is accompanied by a deer, a symbol of immortality. Similar items, also known as Dehua porcelain, were created as early as the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644). This example, however, likely dates from the Qing Dynasty (1644-1912). The clear glaze over the white porcelain can create a ...

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Porcelain Sauce Boat

This Meissen porcelain sauce boat, in the traditional onion pattern, had lost a handle. In order to replace it we molded and then cast a replacement from the handle on the other side. We used a water-clear, non-yellowing optical epoxy that we carefully tinted to be a good match for the surrounding porcelain – not only the right color, but the correct degree of translucency. This handle, when joined to the piece, fit so well that we decided with the ...

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Shattered Porcelain Vase

This porcelain vase was so smashed that it is hard to imagine what happened to it. It required the patient, deductive skill of a jigsaw puzzle enthusiast to fit all the pieces together. Then the chips were filled and the lines coated with an optical epoxy so that the pieces could be safely sanded smooth without damaging the porcelain surface underneath. Airbrushing and careful hand-painting followed, with a final coat of a durable glaze that was hand rubbed to the ...

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Heirloom Porcelain Plate

This is a straightforward job for our studio, and a few examples need to be shown because such jobs are, in fact, the bulk of the work that we do: plates and other objects that may have no great value, but are a part of someone’s life – for whatever reason. In such cases we are often asked to put the pieces together, to fill whatever missing areas there may be, and to hand paint the damage. The effect of such ...

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Blue and White Chinese Ewer

This lovely early Ming xuan-de pitcher had old cracks in the handle and the spout support. We sealed these cracks first to give as much strength as possible to its slender curves, then we filled and airbrushed the cracks, recreating the spreading softness that the underglaze blue cobalt glaze acquires when it is fired. It is a challenge to soften these color edges, and to perfectly recreate the subtle range of blue shades that the cobalt takes on as it ...

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