1000 Butterflies Fencai Plate

[kardinalisimo]

18th century export?

[peterp]

I think this is export porcelain. The bottom of the plate undeniably looks 18th century, but I know the decoration only from the early 20th century. Unless you find some proof that such plates were  made 100 years earlier, I'm afraid you may have a later decoration on an older plate.

[kardinalisimo]

Thanks Peter.
I have not looked for a reputable sources yet.  Whatever I find online with that foot rim and decoration is described 18th century.  I never thought that the 1000 butterflies( or whatever it  is called) was a later creation.
I doubt I can find something similar at the major auction houses so maybe I should look around at the Chinese websites. What would be the right Chinese keywords?

[peterp]

Just look for images on the English site. This is not a domestic pattern. Most Chinese probably never have seen one. But, if you find something earlier than what I have seen, please let me know. I'm sure this is export porcelain. Thus, if it is from the Daoguang reign or earlier it would be canton ware, probably.

[Stan]

Hi kardinalisimo, Peter is right I have seen this design on 20th century porcelain at antique shows, but the bottom is 18th century as Peter said, I looked on the internet and could not find anything 18th century with that design, also I noticed that the yellow was sightly deferent from the 18th century porcelain yellows when I was comparing your colors to the older porcelains.

[Stan]

Hi Peter, all the Yongzheng Imperial porcelain that I looked at did not have a crackle in any of the colors and I did not notice any crackle on any of the imperial porcelain, is that a fact or am I reaching a conclusion on limited searches at the high auctions?

[peterp]

I do not know if Yongzheng colors had any crackling, but I would be careful with such assumptions, imperial or not. You could as well say that the Yongzheng reign was too short to have much changes of the on-glaze colors, and that could be one reason - the use of fencai colors that are less subject to crackling.
Crackling is sometimes due to age or firing conditions, but sometimes it is also due to the consistency of colors. Some colors develop crackling more easily during firing. On some items we can  see crackling of only one single color, sometimes.

[Stan]

I noticed in my search that none of the 18th century famille porcelain had crackling in any of the colors and the colors are very translucent, I was just wondering if thats  true for all 18th century porcelain, I can tell if it is from age or if it is just the one color that would have the crackle, it is was age it would not be just in one color but small to larger crackles if from age.

[Qst42know]

Is that a common practice, decorating older plain items?

[Stan]

Most of the time, an old piece is embellished to make the item appear more desirable so it could be sold for more money, and yes it is done frequently, old vase that would not have much decoration would be a good example, it would be redecorated and fired again, like the plate.

[peterp]

We call that "later painted" or "overpainted" porcelain. From a collectors point of view I would rather have a plain old item with little decoration than one with decoration made in recent times.

[Stan]

I agree, and thanks for the term, Overpainted, I believe that I have a few Ming items that have been overpainted, I bought them at an auction and they were sold as Ming, but some of them have a high gloss, but they look old, the bottoms and decoration look Ming but the high gloss tells me that they have been reglazed, I see them all the time at the auctions, but I think people are getting wise to them and they are not selling like they did before, you can pick them up for about $100.00 at the auctions and the usually come in groups of items.

[Stan]

Such items that have been overpainted are considered to be as old as the last modification, so if it were Qing dynasty and decorated in the 20th century, it would be considered 20th century, I learned that from Peter.
I do not think that I will forget that term because I have a lot of these overpainted items, your not alone Kardinalisimo.

[kardinalisimo]

So, it was either overpainted or an older plain body was used. Did not Peter say before that there were a lot of pieces from 18th century that were never used and painted and later on they were decorated?
I am not a big fan of the mandarin/medallion pieces so I got this plate because it is a bit different.
There are also people collecting clobber ware - underglaze blue export pieces that were overpainted. It was very common in England. Sometimes they would do it on a damaged piece to cover the repairs. But otherwise to me they ruined the beauty of the originals.

[Stan]

Kardinalisimo, I have heard of clobber ware before but I have no idea what it is could you tell me please, thanks.