Firing techniques of Yaozhou Kiln Ceramics

Name of China's national intangible cultural heritage: Yaozhou Kiln Ceramic Firing skills

Applicant: Tongchuan City, Shaanxi Province

Project No.: 358

Project No.: VIII - 8

Time of publication: 2006 (the first batch)

Category: traditional art

Region: Shaanxi Province

Type: new item

Applicant: Tongchuan City, Shaanxi Province

Protection unit: Tongchuan Ceramic Research Institute

Brief introduction of Yaozhou Kiln Ceramic Firing Technology:

Applicant: Tongchuan City, Shaanxi Province

Yaozhou Kiln was a famous producing area of Chinese ceramics in Tang Dynasty, and reached its peak in Song Dynasty. It became the largest kiln system among the "six kiln systems" in China, and its products became the representative of northern celadon. Yaozhou Kiln, with Huangbao town in Tongchuan as the center, is densely distributed along both sides of the Qihe River, which is historically known as "Shili Pottery Workshop". At the same time, there are also kilns in Lidi, Shangdian village, Chenlu town and Yuhua village, which are arranged in turn and stretch for hundreds of miles. After the war of the Jin and Yuan Dynasties and the turbulent changes of the dynasties, all the pottery factories had stopped burning, but Chenlu town has continued to be an important porcelain making town in the northwest. Almost every family in 11 villages of Chenlu town is firing porcelain, which is known as "Chenlu never sleeps". After the founding of the people's Republic of China, the town workshop and state-owned ceramic factory. In the 1970s, with the help of Li Guozhen and other experts, Yaozhou Kiln restored its traditional skills and produced six series of ceramics, including Yaozhou celadon, black glaze and patterned porcelain, white glaze and patterned porcelain, orchid porcelain, rust patterned porcelain and patterned glaze, which became the pillar industry of Tongchuan City.

The traditional technology of Yaozhou Kiln is mainly reflected in the following seven aspects: raw material collection, composition and processing, mud storage and rolling, hand drawing and trimming, hand carving, engraving, engraving, decal and printing, glaze matching, preparation and application, sagger and kiln furniture production and loading, flame atmosphere and firing. A product should go through 17 processes, such as material selection, selection, weathering, proportioning, pastry mud, aging, cooked mud, kneading mud, hand drawing, trimming, glaze selection, preparation, glazing, manual decoration (carving, carving, pasting, printing), kiln furniture production, loading and firing. Each process has corresponding technical requirements, and those who master relevant skills are called "craftsmen".

In the past 20 years, under the impact of modern industrial products, the ceramic industry in Chenlu town was once in a depression. In addition, young people went out to work one after another, and the older "craftsmen" died one after another, which made the traditional ceramic skills spread for more than a thousand years face the danger of no successor and need urgent rescue.