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Underglaze red Chinese vase

Underglaze red vase

I have got here a picture of a Chinese vase. We don't no much about it and we would like to have some information about it.

We bought this vase at a local market in Guanzhou (China) from some very poor people for 2 dollars.

Perfectly modern manganese red

This vase is a perfectly modern piece. The decoration is fairly traditional in style and it should no doub't be worth considerably more then the US $ 2 you paid.

I would hesitated to call it a "fake" since it is only it's general style which could be said to be anatique. The vase is based on a Yuan dynasty original but the paste and glaze is wrong. Interestingly enough manganese - which has been discussed at length here earlier - are used as the red colorant for the decoration instead of copper as on the original. The reason for this being that manganese are by far more stable and gives a better red color if not of exactly the same shade as cupper.

Jan-Erik Nilsson

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This information is given as an example of private conversation only and is not intended to be used as a promotion of any individual piece. All opinions are the authors and are given as such with all hazards of judging anything from a photo.

Copyright © Jan-Erik Nilsson, Göteborg 2001.