Cubiertas Formación de pendientes y faldones

Novus Atlas Sinensis (detail)

Fig. 3.2.1.19 Blanc de chine Guanyin seated on a rockwork throne and two standing acolytes, the Jade Maiden and the Golden Youth, Shoukai

Dehua kilns, Fujian province Ming dynasty, Wanli/Chongzhen reign

(1620–1644), c.1620–1640 Height: 23.5cm © S. Marchant & Son 2006

196 Silk, Porcelain and Lacquer Trade in Chinese Porcelain 197

between the end of the Ming and the rise of the Qing dynasty, conducting astronomical, geographical and topographical observations. In 1651, Martini returned back to Europe via the Philippines and Batavia (present-day Jakarta), where he was taken prisoner for one year by the Dutch. He then travelled to Bergen in Norway, to Hamburg in Germany and finally to Amsterdam in the Dutch Republic, where he published his Novus Atlas Sinensis. The atlas included 15 maps of provinces that formed the Chinese Empire at the time Martini lived there. It was first published as the sixth volume of Theatrum

Orbis Terrarium by the Dutchman Johan Blaeuw. A

detail showing the Guanyin is published in Donnelly, pp. 134–135; John Ayers, ‘Blanc-de-Chine: Some Reflections’, Transactions of the Oriental Ceramic

Society, Vol. 51, 1986–1987, p. 29, fig. 17; Kerr and

Ayers, et. al., 2002, p. 29, fig. 17; and Canepa, 2012/3, p. 3, fig. 3.

438 For an example in the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in Richmond, Bequest of Forrest R. Brauer (85. 1502), see Ayers, 2002 p. 99, no. 50.

439 Sheaf and Kilburn, 1988, p. 73, pl. 113 and Apendix A. 440 Published in Ostkamp, 2014, pp. 75–76, fig. 28. A blue-and-white wine cup with a similar fishing net pattern on the exterior and a single fish on the centre interior is found in the Sir Percival David Collection now housed at the British Museum in London. Published in Stacey Pierson, Illustrated Catalogue of Underglaze Blue and Copper red Decorated Porcelains in the Percival David Foundation of

Chinese Art, London, 2004, p. 103, no. C615.

441 Two of these saucer-dishes, one of them shown upside down, are published in Sheaf and Kilburn, 1988, p. 45, pl. 55. In April 1643, the VOC placed an order of porcelain with the Chinese merchant

to 1650, that saucer-dishes of this exact form with the fishing net pattern on both the interior and exterior were recovered from the Hatcher junk (c.1643),441 and that

one appears depicted turned upside-down alongside a Kraak klapmuts in a still life painting by the Amsterdam artist Jan Janz Treck (1605/6–1652), dated 1645, proves that this type of saucer-dish was imported into the Dutch Republic in the early 1640s (Fig. 3.2.1.21).442

Porcelain, as has been shown in the previous pages, made frequent appearance on the laid tables depicted in still life paintings of various artists of the Dutch Republic in the early seventeenth century.443 _{A closer examination of these paintings reveals a}

variety of porcelain shapes mainly brought to the Dutch Republic as cargoes of the VOC, all depicted in great detail together with other imported and/or local objects. The artists’ careful observation and rendering of the various pieces of porcelain and their painted decorative motifs undoubtedly denotes the great appreciation that porcelain had in the Dutch Republic at the time. The majority of pieces depicted seem to be Kraak porcelain, thus confirming the information provided by the VOC documents as well as marine and land archaeological finds discussed above.

By the early 1610s, porcelain appears to have been already incorporated in the daily life of middle class residents. The historian Johannes Isaäcs Pontanus (1571– 1639) in his book describing Amsterdam and its history, published in Latin in 1611 and in Dutch in 1614, notes that ‘the East India traffic has brought a large amount of porcelain to the Netherlands … that is why one must conclude about the porcelains, the abundance of which grows daily, that only because of these navigations they come

Fig. 3.2.1.20 Blue-and-white saucer dishes excavated at Dokke, Vlissingen, in use between 1600 and 1650

Jingdezhen kilns, Jiangxi province Ming dynasty, Wanli/Chongzhen reign (1573–1644)

© Sebastiaan Ostkamp

Tecklim for a total of 146,000 pieces, including 5,000 small ‘net’ dishes. Cited in Ibid., Appendix B, p. 169. 442 Published in N.R.A Vroom, De schilders van

het monochrome banketje, N.V. Uitgevers-Mij

“Kosmos”, Amsterdam, 1945, p. 163, no. 143.

443 For a comprehensive study on the porcelain depicted in Dutch paintings, see Berger Hochstrasser, 2007. 444 Cited in Volker, 1954, p. 23; and Berger Hochstrasser,

2007, p. 133.

445 Published in Van der Pijl-Ketel, 1982, p. 35; and Berger Hochstrasser, 2007, pp. 128 and 130, fig. 64. 446 Published in Van der Pijl-Ketel, 1982, p. 35. 447 Spriggs, 1964–1966; and Berger Hochstrasser, 2007.

Fig. 3.2.1.21 Still life with a pewter

pitcher and a Chinese bowl

Oil on oak, 66.5cm x 50.5cm Jan Janz Treck (1605/6–1652), dated 1645 Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest (inv. no. 1064)

to be with us in nearly daily use with the common people’.444 _{A few group portrait}

paintings indicate that porcelain was used as tableware in middle-class households by the late 1620s. These include a painting entitled Family in Prayer before Mealtime by an unknown artist, dated 1627, which depicts a Kraak cup, of the type known as ‘crow cup’, with a simplified version of its panelled decoration containing berries alongside traditional pewter tableware with bread or a large cooked fowl (Fig. 3.2.1.22).445

This ‘crow cup’, probably dating to the Wanli or Tianqi reigns, is similar to extant examples, such as the one in the Princessehof Museum in Leeuwarden (Fig. 3.2.1.23). A painting entitled Merry Company by the Haarlem artist Isack Elyas, dated 1629, alludes to the Five Senses depicting a group of well-dressed people enjoying food, drink and music seated around a table with pewter plates, a salt, and a jug, together with a Kraak plate with a panelled rim border that is also being used to serve berries (Fig. 3.2.1.24).446 _{A few other similar examples, as noted by Spriggs and Berger}

Hochstrasser, are known.447

In the Dutch Republic, porcelain not only had a practical function, but also ornamental. As recently noted by Bischoff, documentary evidence shows that formal arrangements of porcelain were adopted for interior decoration in the Dutch Republic by the early decades of the seventeenth century. Female members of the House of Orange not only collected large quantities of porcelain, but also had separate rooms or cabinets in their palaces specially created to display pieces of porcelain arranged in groups. For instance, Louise de Coligny (1555–1620), fourth and last wife of Stadtholder William I of Orange, had 285 pieces of porcelain in one room at the

Trade in Chinese Porcelain 199 198

Fig. 3.2.1.22 Family in Prayer before Mealtime

Oil on panel, 120.5cm x 191cm Anonymous, Dutch Republic, dated 1627 Museum Catharijneconvent, Utrecht (inv. no. RMCC s49)

Fig. 3.2.1.23 Kraak bowl

Jingdezhen kilns, Jiangxi province

Ming dynasty, Wanli/Tianqi reign (1573–1627) Diameter: 10.6cm; height: 5.3cm

Princessehof Museum, Leeuwarden (inv. no. GMP 1929/32)

Next pages 200–201 Fig. 3.2.1.24 Merry Company

Oil on panel, 47.1cm x 63.2cm Isack Elyas, dated 1629 Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam (museum no. SK-A-1754)

448 Mentioned in Juliet Claxton, ‘The Countess of Arundel’s Dutch Pranketing Room: an inventory of all the parcells or Purselin, glasses and other Goods now remaining in the Pranketing Roome at Tart Hall, 8th Sept 1641’, Journal of the History of

Collections, Volume 22, Issue 2, 2010, p. 189; and

Cordula Bischoff, ‘Women collectors and the rise of the porcelain cabinet’, in Van Campen and Eliëns, 2014, p. 171.

449 Mentioned in A.M.L.E. Erkelens, ‘Die Porzellan- sammlung der Amalia van Solms: Aufstellungsweise und Einfluss in Deutschland’, in W. Savelsberg and C. Völkel (eds.), Die Niederlande und Deutschland. Aspekte der Beziehungen zweier Länder im 17. Und

18. Jahrhundert, Dessau, 2000, p. 112; and Bischoff,

2014, p. 264, note 81.

450 Mentioned in Erkelens, 2000, p. 112; and Bischoff, 2014, p. 171.

451 In 1648–1649, after the death of her husband, Amalia van Solms had a two-part room created as a

‘groote porceleyn-cabinet’ in her newly established

apartments at Noordeinde. Erkelens, 2000, pp. 108-115; and C. Willemijn Fock, ‘The Apartments of Frederick Henry and Amalia of Solms; Princely Splendour and the Triumph of Porcelain’, in Peter van der Ploeg and Carola Vermeeren (eds.), Princely Patrons. The Collection of Frederick Henry of Orange

and Amalia of Solms in The Hague, Zwolle, 1997, pp.

76–86, p. 8of. Mentioned in Bischoff, 2014, p. 171. 452 Mentioned in Fock, 1997, p. 80.

453 Viallé, 2010, p. 190.

454 VOC 148, Resoluties van de Heren Zeventien, November 25, 1642. Cited in Viallé, 2010, pp. 207– 209. Mentioned in Van Campen, 2014, p. 197. 455 Mentioned in Hugh J. Mason, ‘Charikleia at

the Mauritshuis’, in Marília P. Futre Pinheiro and Stephen J. Harrison (eds.), Fictional Traces: Receptions of the Ancient Novel, Vol.

2, Ancient Narrative Supplementum 14.2,

Groningen, 2011, p. 9; and Bischoff, 2014, p. 181.

456 Ibid., pp. 188–189.

457 Jan van Campen, ‘Kraakporselein ‘tot oogen lust en pronkery’’, Keramika, Jaargang 14, nummer 2, zomer 2002, pp. 24–27; Sargent, 2012, p. 11; and Van Campen, 2014, pp. 191 and 194.

458 The inventory is published in Th. H. Lunsingh Scheurleer, C. W. Fock and A. J. van Dissel, Het

Rapenburg; geschiedenis van een Leidse gracht,

Leiden, 1986–1992, Part IIIa, pp. 397–403. Cited in Van Campen, 2014, p. 191.

459 Published in Ibid., pp. 192–193, fig. 2.

460 For a brief discussion on the use of such cabinets in Spain, see Krahe, 2014, Vol. I, pp. 156–157, fig. 45. 461 Richard Carnac Temple (ed.), The Travels of Peter

Mundy in Europe and Asia, 1608–1667, Vol. IV, Travels

in Europe, 1639–1647, Cambridge, 1925, pp. 70–71.

Noordeinde Palace in The Hague, displayed in two rows of three shelves, placed one above the other.448 Louise de Coligny may have acquired her passion for porcelain

as early as 1604, when she was asked to select porcelain from the cargo of a ship captured by the VOC, in all probability the Santa Catarina.449 A description written

in 1634 indicates that Catharine Belgica (1578–1648), a daughter of William I from his third marriage who lived in Noordeinde Palace from 1622 to 1648, displayed her porcelain on red- and gilt-painted shelves alongside large porcelain pots placed on stands.450 Two years earlier, in 1632, Amalia van Solms-Braunfels, who was married

to William I’s fourth legitimate son Frederick Henry of Orange, third Stadholder of the States General, had created a cabinet, and around 1632–1634 a gallery, to display porcelain along with other curiosities at Noordeinde Palace.451 _{In 1639, the}

Amsterdam Chamber of the VOC asked the Zeeland Chamber to set aside various types of the finest porcelain to be presented as gift to Amalia.452 _{We know that}

Amalia’s porcelain collection increased considerably in 1642. That year, during the visit of Queen Henrietta Maria and her daughter Princess Maria Henrietta Stuart to the Dutch Republic, the VOC sent deputies to The Hague with porcelain gifts for them and Amalia.453 _{Maria and Amalia each received 642 pieces of porcelain.}454

Frederick Henry and his wife and cousin Amalia, who were heirs of the House of Orange, established a court in The Hague that could be compared to European royal courts in France, Spain and England, through displays of wealth, by securing political alliances through marriage and above all by building palaces, and becoming prominent art collectors and patrons.455 The princesses of the House of Orange, as convincingly

argued by Bischoff, created rooms with large porcelain collections in their palaces that served not only as symbols of their high status, but at the same time represented their political and dynastic interests.456

Van Campen and Sargent have noted that in the early seventeenth century porcelain also gained a prominent decorative function in the interior of the households of middle class residents, who used it to show their prosperity.457 Emulating the taste

for acquiring and collecting porcelain of the Oranges/Stadholders of the Dutch Republic and upper classes, the urban middle class began to display small pieces of porcelain inside hanging cupboards in private rooms. For example, the inventory of the estate of Geertrut Uytten Engh, the widow of a well-known lawyer who died in 1616, lists in her bedroom a closed hanging cupboard which contains silverwork and ‘2 porcelain cups with silver bases’.458 The appreciation for porcelain was so high

among the middle class that silver or silver-gilt mounts were sometimes added to some pieces, a custom that as we saw occurred earlier in Portugal, Spain and the Southern Netherlands. Small hanging cupboards with glass doors for displaying small precious objects appear to have been popular during the 1620s and 1630s, as suggested by an engraving showing two designs for wall cupboards published in series Boutique

Menuseries in 1621, and then again in 1642.459 This would most probably have been

the forerunner of the cabinets with glass doors that came to be used to display objects throughout Europe at the end of the seventeenth century.460 The English traveller

Peter Mundy, who visited Amsterdam in 1640 observed in his diary that the people are ‘… All in general striving to adorne their houses, especially the outer or street roome, with costly peeces, …. Alsoe their other Furniture and Ornaments off their dwellings very Costly and Curious, Full of pleasure and home contentment, as Ritche Cupboards, Cabinetts, etts., Imagery, porcelaine, Costly Fine cages with birds, etts.; all these commonly in any house off indifferent quality’.461

202 Silk, Porcelain and Lacquer Trade in Chinese Porcelain 203

462 Published in Van Campen, 2002, p. 26, fig. 3; Sargent, 2012, p. 12, fig. 8; and Van Campen, 2014, p. 194, fig. 3. Kraak dishes with panelled rim borders and small bowls with continuous scenes in the so-called Transitional style continued to appear depicted, usually arranged symmetrically on shelves, in group portraits of the 1650s, as evidenced by the painting Interior with a Dordrecht Family dated 1656 by the artist Nicolaes Maes (1634–1693), who worked in his native city Dordrecht and in Amsterdam, housed in the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena. Published in Berger Hochstrasser, 2007, p. 146, fig. 80. 463 Published in A. Bredius, Künstler-inventare, The

Hague, 1915–1922, Part I, pp. 129–147. Mentioned in C. W. Fock, ‘Kunst en rariteiten in het Hollandse interieur’, in E. Bergvelt and R. Kistemaker (eds.),

De Wereld binner Handbereik; Nederlandse kunst-

en rariteitenverzamelingen, 1585–1735, exhibition

catalogue, Amsterdams Historisch Museum, Zwolle and Amsterdam, 1992, p. 79; and Van Campen, 2014, p. 194. Visual evidence is provided by an anonymous painting, possibly by Christiaen Coeuershof (c.1596–1659), Portrait of an Enkhuizen family in

interior, c.1635, published in Ibid., p. 195, fig. 4.

Visual sources depicting interiors also attest to the presence of considerable quantities of porcelain in the Dutch Republic at this time giving us an insight on the variety of porcelain available and the manner in which porcelain was displayed in the domestic sphere. An anonymous painting dating to c.1630–1635, possibly depicting a West Frisian interior, shows the top ledge of a wooden wall panelling filled with a row of 15 Kraak dishes, and another in front of 20 Kraak bowls and cups, some of which appear to be decorated in the so-called Transitional style (Fig. 3.2.1.25).462

Small porcelain pieces with similar blue-and-white decoration could also be placed on top of the lintel above the door, while others of larger size were arranged symmetrically on top of a cupboard. This is clear in an inventory drawn up after the death of Jan Bassé (1571/76–1636), a painter, dealer and art collector, which mentions that he had two collector’s cabinets, with porcelain both on top and inside the cupboard, as well as pieces of porcelain in various drawers.463 This manner to display porcelain had

been used earlier in the Southern Netherlands, as demonstrated by the Sense of Sight, one of a cycle of five paintings by Jan Brueghel the Elder and Peter Paul Rubens made for Archduke Albert VII and Isabella Clara Eugenia in 1617–1618, discussed earlier (Fig. 3.1.3.1a and b).

To sum up, written sources have shown that porcelain began to be imported into the Northern Netherlands before the foundation of the VOC, in 1602. Only a few well-to-do residents, however, owned a small quantity of porcelain. Archaeological excavations have yielded shards of Jingdezhen blue-and-white porcelain dating to

Fig. 3.2.1.25 Family in interior

Oil on panel, 86cm x 118cm Anonymous, Dutch Republic, c.1630 Musée d’Art et d’Histoire, Geneva (inv. no. BASZ 5)

the Jiajing reign, which relate closely to porcelain traded by the Portuguese in the 1550s. Other shards with blue-and-white and Kinrande decoration, dating to the early Wanli reign, are similar to those traded by the Spanish in the mid 1570s. Thus the porcelain may have been brought as booty taken from the Portuguese or Spanish, or by the Early Companies that preceded the VOC. These finds confirm that porcelain was incidentally found in Dutch households as early as the second half of the sixteenth century.

By the turn of the century, porcelain was being imported into the Northern Netherlands in a more structured way as part of private consignments. Porcelain, both fine and coarse, was also being brought as booty seized from Portuguese ships trading in Asia. The Directors of the newly established VOC immediately began to instruct the Company servants in Bantam and Patani to purchase porcelain of various specific types to satisfy the taste and demand not only of the Dutch domestic market but also the international markets in Europe. The range of porcelain that according to the Directors could be sold in Amsterdam was both fine and coarse, and included

Kraak. Visual sources attest to the importation of Kraak klapmutsen, saucer dishes,

dishes and ‘crow cups’ as early as 1603. Textual sources indicate that by 1617 the enourmous quantities of porcelain imported into the now Dutch Republic governed by the States General also included porcelain made at the private kilns of Zhangzhou. The supply and demand, however, was difficult to regulate at this time. Trade was not only conducted by the VOC but also by Dutch private individuals. Although the VOC tried to limit the private porcelain imports because they affected not only the purchase price in Asia but also the types available for sale in the Dutch Republic, the Company employees despite the menace of punishement and confiscations clearly ignored the limits imposed. Surviving bills of lading, maritime archaeological finds from VOC ships, and various Dutch visual sources have shown that the Dutch imported smilar types of Jingdezhen, Zhangzhou and Dehua porcelain to those traded by the Portuguese and Spanish. Most of the porcelain imported was blue-and-white of the Kraak and so-called Transitional types, but it also included small quantities of

Kinrande, Linglong, Blanc de chine and porcelain decorated with overglaze enamels.

A few types of blue-and-white porcelain made for the Chinese domestic market were also imported in small quantities. The Dutch acquired the porcelain from Chinese junk traders who initially brought trade goods to Bantam, and then to Batavia (VOC headquarters in Asia) and for a brief period also to Formosa. To maintain a regular supply of porcelain to the Dutch Republic, the Company employees in these Asian settlements were forced to acquire any porcelain brought by the junks, even if not entirely satisfied in terms of quality. The VOC was greatly concerned with making choices that offered the higest possible profits when purchasing or ordering porcelain,