Title
Pair of enamelled bowls with covers
Year/Period
Jiaqing mark and period (1796-1820), Qing dynasty
Region
Jingdezhen, Jiangxi province, China
Object Type
Material
Technique
Accession No.
2002-00102
Collection of
Credit Line
From the Xiang Xue Zhuang Collection in memory of Dr Tan Tsze Chor
The decoration on these bowls is unusual. It shows pieces of burnt paper, chess pawns and dominoes. Burnt papers are part of a design known as 'bapo', which means 'many broken'. The main elements of bapo include book pages, fragments of rubbings, paintings and calligraphy layered on top of one another, resulting in a collage-like effect. The design is also referred to as 'jinhuidui' or 'a stack of brocade ashes' as these fragments and pages are often depicted with burnt edges.
