Chinese celadon bowl on a carved hardwood stand

A celadon-glazed bowl decorated under the glaze with flower heads among scrolling foliage, with a six-character mark to the base, on a carved hardwood stand. Decoration under a celadon glaze is technically demanding: the design has to survive being read through a thick, slightly opaque green film, so it is usually incised or carved as well as painted.

The bowl has two hairline cracks running down from the rim, the longer of them 4.5 cm. Both are disclosed and priced in. Hairlines from the rim are the commonest fault in bowls of this size — the rim is the thinnest part and takes every knock — and they matter far less to a scholarly buyer than a repaired chip, because nothing has been added or concealed.

Celadon, and the stand, in context

“Celadon” is a Western term for a family of high-fired wares whose glaze is coloured by a small percentage of iron oxide fired in reduction — the Smithsonian’s definition — and the results run from sky blue to olive green. Chinese celadon has a continuous history from the Yue kilns of the Tang through Longquan to the refined Qing revivals at Jingdezhen, which the British Museum describes as glossy with tiny bubbles.

The carved hardwood stand is part of the object as it has been kept, and it raises a practical point for overseas buyers. Chinese hardwood stands are often rosewood, and Dalbergia species are listed under CITES Annex B; but annotation #15 exempts finished products containing up to 10 kg of listed wood per shipment, which a single stand falls well within. We state what we know of the wood on request, and say when we do not know.

Read more: import duty, CITES and shipping and celadon and Longquan.