Copper Red
deep red bowl
\'Hong\' is the Chinese word for red, and the colour has been central to Imperial rule since the advent of the Ming Emperor.
The best Ming red was perfected in the reign of Xuande, and is known as jihong, or sacrificial red. The use of the character ji meaning sacrificial has been described by Bushell as \"the colour of the sacrificial cups which were employed by the Emperor in the worship of the Sun\". Another, more common term is \'xianhong\' or fresh red: this was used in Ming times and more widely copied in the Qing Dynasty. There are many others, usually with a descriptive term relating to blood, such as ox-blood (sang-de-boeuf), calves blood, or others such as pigs liver, for those more muddy reds that failed to excite!
playing with porcelain has finally inspired me to examine the rich and rare phenomenon of Copper Reds. The glaze has a fascinating history through the last 1000 years of Chinese ceramics mainly through its association with blood! It has been prized for its livid colour; it is also notoriously difficult to achieve, due to the fugitive nature of the copper responsible for the colour.
First firing of two tests was encouraging, with good red developing but generally too\'livery\' in tone (a rather murky purple red called pigs liver, for good reason!)
Subsequent firings have shown more illumination on the fine tuning needed to give a proper blood red, with a spectacular little porcelain bottle emerging from the latest firing...
December update: wow! small modifications to the recipe and an altered firing schedule produced some outstanding reds, if I do say so... a very deep, blood red with white rims but still a stiff glaze (that is, not so fluid that it runs off the pots). I am excited by the prospect of moving this onto some bigger pots, including two-colour ware.
(TKJ will be impressed - this is developed from the Xuande reds we worked on for his study all those years ago!)