![MET DP-12231-014 (cropped)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a8/MET_DP-12231-014_%28cropped%29.jpg)
Kraak ware or Kraak porcelain (Dutch ''Kraakporselein'') is a type of
Chinese export porcelain
Chinese export porcelain includes a wide range of Chinese porcelain that was made (almost) exclusively for export to Europe and later to North America between the 16th and the 20th century. Whether wares made for non-Western markets are covered b ...
produced mainly in the late
Ming Dynasty
The Ming dynasty (), officially the Great Ming, was an imperial dynasty of China, ruling from 1368 to 1644 following the collapse of the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty. The Ming dynasty was the last orthodox dynasty of China ruled by the Han peo ...
, in the
Wanli Wanli was the era name of the Chinese Ming dynasty.
Wanli may also refer to:
*Wanli Emperor (1563–1620), the 14th emperor of the Chinese Ming dynasty
*Wanli District, Nanchang, district of Nanchang, Jiangxi, China
*Wanli District, New Taipei, a ...
reign (1573–1620), but also in the
Tianqi (1620–1627) and the
Chongzhen
Chongzhen () (5 February 1628 – 25 April 1644) was the era name of the Chongzhen Emperor, the last emperor of the Ming dynasty of China. Chongzhen was also the Ming dynasty's final era name.
Comparison table
Other eras contemporaneous with ...
(1627–1644). It was among the first Chinese export wares to arrive in Europe in mass quantities, and was frequently featured in
Dutch Golden Age painting
Dutch Golden Age painting is the painting of the Dutch Golden Age, a period in Dutch history roughly spanning the 17th century, during and after the later part of the Eighty Years' War (1568–1648) for Dutch independence.
The new Dutch Republ ...
s of
still life subjects with foreign luxuries.
The wares have "suffered from imprecise terminology", sometimes being loosely used for many varieties of Chinese export
blue and white pottery
"Blue and white pottery" () covers a wide range of white pottery and porcelain decorated under the glaze with a blue pigment, generally cobalt oxide. The decoration is commonly applied by hand, originally by brush painting, but nowadays by s ...
. Strictly defined, it "is distinguished by the arrangement of its ornament into panels; these usually radiate to a bracketed rim notorious for its liability to chip". It is a sub-class of
Jingdezhen ware
Jingdezhen porcelain () is Chinese porcelain produced in or near Jingdezhen in Jiangxi province in southern China. Jingdezhen may have produced pottery as early as the sixth century CE, though it is named after the reign name of Emperor Zhenzon ...
, mostly made as "deep bowls and wide dishes", decorated with motifs from nature, in a style not used on wares for the domestic Chinese market.
![MET DP-12231-015 (cropped)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/08/MET_DP-12231-015_%28cropped%29.jpg)
The quality of the porcelain used to form Kraak ware is much disputed among scholars; some claim that it is surprisingly good, in certain cases indistinguishable from that produced on the domestic market; others imply that it is a dismal shadow of the truly fine ceramics China was capable of producing. Rinaldi comes to a more even-handed conclusion, noting that it "forms a middle category between much heavier wares, often coarse, and definitely finer wares with well levigated clay and smooth glaze that does not shrink on the rim... " Thus looking at ceramic production in China at the time from a larger prospective, Kraak ware falls between the best examples and a typical provincial output, such as the contemporary
Swatow ware, also made for export, but to South-East Asia and Japan.
Name
Kraak porcelain is believed to be named after the
Portuguese
Portuguese may refer to:
* anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Portugal
** Portuguese cuisine, traditional foods
** Portuguese language, a Romance language
*** Portuguese dialects, variants of the Portuguese language
** Portu ...
ships (
Carracks), in which it was transported. Carrak—or ''caracca'' in Italian or Spanish—is itself believed to be a derivative of the
Arabic
Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walter ...
term for the type of trading ships used in
Renaissance
The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history
The history of Europe is traditionally divided into four time periods: prehistoric Europe (prior to about 800 BC), classical antiquity (800 BC to AD ...
Mediterranean
The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western Europe, Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa ...
trade: ''qaraquir'', meaning simply merchant vessels. Although the link with Carrak ships is generally accepted as the root of the name ''Kraak ware'', other origins of the label have also been proposed. For example, Rinaldi points out that in
Dutch
Dutch commonly refers to:
* Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands
* Dutch people ()
* Dutch language ()
Dutch may also refer to:
Places
* Dutch, West Virginia, a community in the United States
* Pennsylvania Dutch Country
People E ...
the verb ''kraken'' means ''to break'' - a characteristic that certainly is common among Kraak wares. Moreover, the term refers to the type of shelves that often displayed import
blue and white porcelains in
Friesland
Friesland (, ; official fry, Fryslân ), historically and traditionally known as Frisia, is a province of the Netherlands located in the country's northern part. It is situated west of Groningen, northwest of Drenthe and Overijssel, north of ...
, in the north of the Netherlands.
Style
![M-ChinWittelsbacherTeller](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9e/M-ChinWittelsbacherTeller.JPG)
Kraak ware is almost all painted in the
underglaze
Underglaze is a method of decorating pottery in which painted decoration is applied to the surface before it is covered with a transparent ceramic glaze and fired in a kiln. Because the glaze subsequently covers it, such decoration is completely ...
cobalt
Cobalt is a chemical element with the symbol Co and atomic number 27. As with nickel, cobalt is found in the Earth's crust only in a chemically combined form, save for small deposits found in alloys of natural meteoric iron. The free element, p ...
blue and white porcelain style that was perfected under the
Ming dynasty
The Ming dynasty (), officially the Great Ming, was an imperial dynasty of China, ruling from 1368 to 1644 following the collapse of the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty. The Ming dynasty was the last orthodox dynasty of China ruled by the Han peo ...
, although a few examples of dishes over-painted with
vitreous enamel
Vitreous enamel, also called porcelain enamel, is a material made by fusing powdered glass to a substrate by firing, usually between . The powder melts, flows, and then hardens to a smooth, durable vitreous coating. The word comes from the Lati ...
glaze have survived. It is often decorated with variations on the more traditional motifs found on Chinese porcelain, such as stylized flowers (
peonies
The peony or paeony is a flowering plant in the genus ''Paeonia'' , the only genus in the family Paeoniaceae . Peonies are native to Asia, Europe and Western North America. Scientists differ on the number of species that can be distinguished, ...
and
chrysanthemums) and
Buddhist
Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and ...
auspicious emblems. However, most characteristic of Kraak decoration is the use of foliated radial panels. In other words, the surface of the porcelain is divided into segments, each containing its own discrete image.
Shapes included
dishes, bowls, and
vase
A vase ( or ) is an open container. It can be made from a number of materials, such as ceramics, glass, non-rusting metals, such as aluminium, brass, bronze, or stainless steel. Even wood has been used to make vases, either by using tree species ...
s. Kraak ware bowls fall into roughly two types; the first is a deep, unrimmed Chinese style bowl, taking roughly the same shape as the
Qing enameled cup, (''at left''). The second type are called ''klapmutsen''. A klapmuts is somewhat akin to what we would today call a soup-bowl—a broader-based, rimmed style that was new in the Chinese repertoire, and seems to have been exclusively exported to Europe. (Two such examples are at the center of de Heem's ''Still Life'', above: one holds fruit, and the other a shaved ham.)
The specialist Maura Rinaldi suggests that the latter type was designed specifically to serve a European clientele, since there do not seem to be many surviving examples elsewhere in the world, even in the spectacular
Topkapı Palace
The Topkapı Palace ( tr, Topkapı Sarayı; ota, طوپقپو سرايى, ṭopḳapu sarāyı, lit=cannon gate palace), or the Seraglio, is a large museum in the east of the Fatih district of Istanbul in Turkey. From the 1460s to the complet ...
collection, which houses the most extensive selection of Kraak ware of all. Noting the importance of soups and stews in European diet, Rinaldi proposes that klapmusten were developed to satisfy a foreign demand, noting that the heavy, long-handled, metal spoon that is common in Europe would have toppled and chipped the high-walled Chinese bowl.
File:Porcelain dish from Jingdezhen, Wanli period, HMA.JPG, Jingdezhen, Wanli period
File:Plate, China, Ming dynasty, 16th-17th century AD, porcelain - Museo Nacional de Artes Decorativas - Madrid, Spain - DSC07945.JPG, Dish with figure
File:Bowl, China, late Ming dynasty, Wanli period, around 1600 AD, blue and white porcelain (Kraakporselein) - Ethnological Museum, Berlin - DSC02013.JPG, Bowl, c. 1600
File:MET 19 136 16 O1 sf (cropped).jpg, Bowl, c. 1600
File:MET 19 136 16 Bm sf (cropped).jpg, Last piece from below
File:2015.04.12.00001a.jpg, Kraak porcelain plate 20 cm across
File:Kraak dish. Porcelain decorated with underglaze blue. From 1591-1613 CE. From Jingdezhen, China. Victoria and Albert Museum, London, UK.jpg, Kraak dish. Porcelain decorated with underglaze blue. 1591-1613 CE. From Jingdezhen, China. Victoria and Albert Museum
The Victoria and Albert Museum (often abbreviated as the V&A) in London is the world's largest museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.27 million objects. It was founded in 1852 and nam ...
, London
Influence
![Osias Beert - Still life on a plain wooden table](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e7/Osias_Beert_-_Still_life_on_a_plain_wooden_table.jpg)
Kraak was copied and imitated all over the world, by potters in
Arita, Japan and
Persia
Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...
—to which Dutch merchants turned when, after the fall of the Ming Dynasty in 1644, Chinese originals were no longer available—and ultimately in
Delft. As noted above, it made a frequent appearance in the sumptuous Dutch paintings of the seventeenth century (''see also the detail of de Heem's ''Banquet Still Life'', at right'').
Today a great deal is learned about Kraak ware through
excavation of
shipwrecks
A shipwreck is the wreckage of a ship that is located either beached on land or sunken to the bottom of a body of water. Shipwrecking may be intentional or unintentional. Angela Croome reported in January 1999 that there were approximately ...
by
marine archaeologists. Because the wreck can usually be dated with some degree of certainty, its contents provides a clear snapshot of production at the moment the vessel went down. Moreover, its location can also indicate its destination point, thus revealing much about international trade routes and outposts at the time. In contrast to the other major European imports of the time (for example textiles or spices), ceramics are able to withstand exposure to water, thus making it the ideal merchandise to serve as
ballast
Ballast is material that is used to provide stability to a vehicle or structure. Ballast, other than cargo, may be placed in a vehicle, often a ship or the gondola of a balloon or airship, to provide stability. A compartment within a boat, ship ...
cargo in the great ships. Yet from another perspective, porcelain's durability in this sense, even withstanding centuries of submersion at the bottom of the sea, means that it has been the good that has endured (sometimes even intact) to tell these tales.
[For a fascinating recent account, brilliantly illustrated, see Jörg, ''Porcelain from the Vung Tau wreck''. A very brief online summary is here:]
/ref>
Gallery of Kraak ware imitations made outside China
File:Iran, isfahan (forse), piatto con uccelli, 1580-1630 ca..JPG, Iran, probably Isfahan, 1580-1630
File:Iran, isfahan (forse), piatto con uccello tra fiori, 1580-1630 ca..JPG, Iran, probably Isfahan, 1580-1630
File:Assiette Nevers Conrade Sèvres.jpg, French Nevers faience, Conrade factory, 1630s
File:Dish MET ES5523.jpg, Japanese export porcelain
Japanese export porcelain includes a wide range of porcelain that was made and decorated in Japan primarily for export to Europe and later to North America, with significant quantities going to south and southeastern Asian markets. Production for ...
, for the European market, c. 1670
File:Dish MET SF1995 268 4.jpg, "Possibly German", late 17th-century
File:Plate with Kraak Design, c. 1690-1700, Arita, hard-paste porcelain with underglaze cobalt - Gardiner Museum, Toronto - DSC00693.JPG, Japan, Arita ware, c. 1690-1700
File:Plate with Kraak Design, c. 1752-1755, Chelsea, soft-paste porcelain with underglaze cobalt - Gardiner Museum, Toronto - DSC00694.JPG, England, Chelsea porcelain
Chelsea porcelain is the porcelain made by the Chelsea porcelain manufactory, the first important porcelain manufactory in England, established around 1743–45, and operating independently until 1770, when it was merged with Derby porcelain. ...
, c. 1752-1755
File:Plat - 18° siècle - Iran - Musée national de céramique - Sèvres - Inventory number 8663.JPG, Iran, 18th-century
Notes
References
* Carswell, John. ''Blue and White: Chinese Porcelain and Its Impact on the Western World''. Exhibition Catalogue. Chicago: David and Alfred Smart Gallery, 1985.
* Crowe, Yolande. ''Persia
Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...
and China: Safavid Blue and White Ceramics in the Victoria and Albert Museum, 1501–1738''. London: Victoria & Albert Museum
The Victoria and Albert Museum (often abbreviated as the V&A) in London is the world's largest museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.27 million objects. It was founded in 1852 and nam ...
, 2002.
* Hochstrasser, Julie. ''Still Life and Trade in the Dutch Golden Age''. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2007.
* Howard, David and John Ayers. ''China for the West: Chinese Porcelain and other Decorative Arts for Export, Illustrated from the Mottahedeh Collection''. London and New York: Sotheby Parke Bernet, 1978.
* Jörg, Christiaan J.A. ''Porcelain from the Vung Tau wreck: The Hallstrom Excavation''. Singapore: Sun Tree Publishing, 2001.
* Kerr, Rosemary. “Early Export Ceramics.” In ''Chinese Export Art and Design''. Ed. Craig Clunas. London: Victoria and Albert Museum, 1987.
* Kroes, Jochem. ''Chinese Armorial
A roll of arms (or armorial) is a collection of coats of arms, usually consisting of rows of painted pictures of shields, each shield accompanied by the name of the person bearing the arms.
The oldest extant armorials date to the mid-13th centu ...
Porcelain for the Dutch Market: Chinese Porcelain with Coats of Arms of Dutch Families''. Den Haag
The Hague ( ; nl, Den Haag or ) is a city and municipality of the Netherlands, situated on the west coast facing the North Sea. The Hague is the country's administrative centre and its seat of government, and while the official capital of ...
: Centraal Bureau voor Generalogie and Zwolle: Waanders Publishers, 2007.
* Rinaldi, Maura. ''Kraak Porcelain: A Moment in the History of Trade''. London: Bamboo Pub, 1989.
*Vainker, S.J., ''Chinese Pottery and Porcelain'', 1991, British Museum Press, 9780714114705
* Wu, Ruoming. ''The origins of Kraak porcelain in the Late Ming Dynasty''. Weinstadt: Verlag Bernhard Albert Greiner, 2014.
External links
*''Kraak Ware Dish'', early 17th century; Chinese for the European market; Hard paste; Diam. 11 in. (28.6 cm); Metropolitan Museum
The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 ...
, New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...
, 1995.268.
''Pair of Chinese Blue and White Kraak Ware Dishes''
Wanli Wanli was the era name of the Chinese Ming dynasty.
Wanli may also refer to:
*Wanli Emperor (1563–1620), the 14th emperor of the Chinese Ming dynasty
*Wanli District, Nanchang, district of Nanchang, Jiangxi, China
*Wanli District, New Taipei, a ...
Reign; Christie's, London: Lot 478/Sale 5093, 29 March 2007
* Kraak ware collection in the Princesshof Museum, Leeuwarden Netherland
A Handbook of Chinese Ceramics
from The Metropolitan Museum of Art
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kraak Porcelain
Chinese porcelain