During a visit to the depot of the porcelain collection of the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden (SKD), Regina Krahl, a specialist in Chinese ceramics, discovered an extremely rare Ru bowl from the Northern Song Dynasty (960-1127) in China
as previously assumed
The Ru bowl does not come from Korea, as previously assumed, but from the Northern Song Dynasty (960-1127) in China. Photo: Dresden State Art Collections/Paul Kuchel
During a research project on the historical holdings of East Asian porcelain in the porcelain collection of the Staatliche Kunststammlungen Dresden (SKD), an extremely rare Chinese Ru bowl has been discovered. The bowl does not originate from Korea, as previously assumed, but from the Northern Song Dynasty (960-1127) in China.
Together with over twenty international experts, including from China, Japan, Taiwan, the Netherlands, Great Britain and the USA, the Staatliche Kunstsammlung Dresden is developing a digital catalog of the porcelain collection. Regina Krahl, a globally recognized specialist in Chinese ceramics, visited the depot in Dresden at the beginning of 2020 and registered the rather inconspicuous, narrow bowl, whose emphatically simple elegance and beauty lies in the quality of the execution, the intensity of the color and the shine of the glaze.
“Among the wealth of Chinese ceramics from all periods, Ru ceramics are the rarest and have always been regarded as the pinnacle of all. This is not only due to their simple beauty, but above all to their historical significance. Less than a hundred pieces have survived worldwide and every single one is registered and published. This treasure trove is not really growing,” explains Regina Krahl. “The “find” in Dresden is therefore not only an exciting discovery for me personally, but also of great interest internationally. To now find a Ru piece in a German museum increases the importance of the local Chinese collections as a whole; however, it is particularly pleasing that the Dresden Ru bowl is an exceptionally good representative of its genre and is of the highest quality among Ru ceramics.”
The bowl was probably made for washing brushes. It has a diameter of 13 centimeters, a straight rim and stands on a narrow, outwardly curved foot. Its restrained blue-green glaze with the crackle typical of Ru ceramics is reminiscent of chipped ice.
The bowl was originally part of the collection of the doctor Oscar Rücker-Embden, which he acquired during a stay in China from 1913 to 1914. In 1927, it was purchased by Ernst Albert Zimmermann, the director of the porcelain collection at the time, and became part of the Dresden collection of Chinese and Korean ceramics. Ernst Zimmermann was regarded as an internationally respected expert on East Asian porcelain and was able to acquire an outstanding collection of early Chinese ceramics for the porcelain collection at an early stage thanks to his expertise in this field and good international connections.
Ru ceramics were only produced for a very short period of around twenty years. Today, only a few pieces have survived. The material was fired in one of the five famous kilns of the Song dynasty. Due to the rarity of Ru ware, the bowl in the Dresden porcelain collection was long thought to have originated in Korea between the 10th and 13th centuries. Korean porcelain and ceramic objects from this period are very similar to Ru pieces, and it is often difficult to distinguish between them.
As early as 2018, employees of the Palace Museum in Beijing pointed out the possibility that the bowl from Dresden could be a Ru piece. This assumption has now been confirmed by Regina Krahl. The object in the SKD porcelain collection is therefore the 88th Ru piece known to date.
“Of course, we knew that the Dresden porcelain collection contains valuable treasures, some of which are still little known. But the fact that one of the legendary Ru ceramics is among them is a real sensation. The bowl is one of the very first ceramics created exclusively for the Chinese imperial court more than 900 years ago. As invaders drove the Song dynasty into southern China shortly afterwards, the Ru ceramics became a mythically charged memento of an idealized lost past immediately after their creation. To this day, they are regarded as icons of Chinese culture, but due to their great rarity, only a few can marvel at them in the original or even call them their own. The historical bowl is a perfect fit for Dresden, where Augustus the Strong assembled the largest collection of Chinese porcelain outside of Asia,” says Julia Weber, Director of the Porcelain Collection.