A RARE LINGWU BLACK CUT-GLAZE 'SCRAFFIATO' FOOTED DISH Xixia dynasty, Lingwu Kiln (1038-1227)

A RARE LINGWU BLACK CUT-GLAZE 'SCRAFFIATO' FOOTED DISH
Xixia dynasty, Lingwu Kiln (1038-1227)
The shallow rounded conical bowl with short cylindrical foot five-petal foliate rim, all under a black glaze thinning to an dark iron-brown in places, the interior carved with two swirling leafy peony sprays on a deeply scratched ground and bordered by three bands of dark glaze at the slightly everted rim with lighter glazed bands between.
7 7/16in (18.9cm) diam, box
Footnotes:
西夏 靈武窯 黑釉刻花盤

Provenance:
Capital Gallery, International Asian Art Fair, Park Avenue Armory, New York, March 2002

來源：
Capital Gallery古董行，國際亞洲藝術博覽會，紐約公園大道軍械庫，2002年三月

This dish belongs to a fairly rare group of wares from the Xixia dynasty (also known as Tangut or Western Xia) in the northwest of China, which coexisted with the Song, Liao and Jin dynasties. The Kingdom was destroyed in 1227 and remained a mystery until relics and literary works in the Xixia language were excavated amongst the ruins of the city of Heicheng in northwest Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region in the early 20th century.

The Lingwu kiln was located at Ciyaobao of Lingwu country, Ningxia, which lies 50 kilometres south of the capital of Xixia, Yinchuan, and was one of the major sites of ceramic production under the Xixia. From 1984 to 1986, the kiln site was excavated resulting in the discovery of shards and kiln implements piled up four meters deep that covered an area of 200,000 square meters. A comprehensive report was published by the Institute of Archaeology of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing, in 1995, Ningxia Lingwu yao fajue baogao, which published shards of vessels decorated with the same technique as the present lot.

Wares of this carved type were produced by glazing the entire yellowish body and then marking out the central and background parts. Three techniques of glaze removal were employed: champlevé in the scraping off the glaze to make the outline of the peonies; incising for the petals and leaves; and sgraffiato in the removal of thicker carved lines. For the background oblique lines were used to accentuate the delicacy of the peony. The sandy clay utilized, resulted in hard and compact bodies that turned pale yellow after firing, while the black glaze was composed of a type of local black slip with iron oxide as the coloring agent. It was fired in an oxidizing kiln at a temperature of approximately 1260°C to result in an aesthetically pleasing contrast between the glazed and exposed body, as well as a textural contrast between the glossy glaze and matte unglazed body. These techniques show that Xixia ceramic production was strongly influenced by Cizhou and Ding wares.

Examples of larger Xixia vessels decorated with cut-glaze techniques, include a jar illustrated by Regina Krahl, Chinese Ceramics from the Meiyintang Collection, vol. 1, London, 1994, pls 454 and 455 and also a white 'cut-glaze' meiping with leafy peony design, from the collection of Ruth and Bruce Dayton and now in the Minneapolis Institute of Art, Minneapolis, acc. no. 2001.8.