Product Code Database
Kraak ware or Kraak porcelain (Dutch Kraakporselein) is a type of Chinese export porcelain produced mainly in the late Ming dynasty, in the Wanli Emperor reign (1573–1620), but also in the Tianqi Emperor (1620–1627) and the Chongzhen (1627–1644).Vinhais L and Welsh J: Kraak Porcelain: the Rise of Global Trade in the 16th and early 17th centuries. Jorge Welsh Books 2008, p. 17 It was among the first Chinese export wares to arrive in Europe in mass quantities, and was frequently featured in Dutch Golden Age paintings of Pronkstilleven.
The wares have "suffered from imprecise terminology", sometimes being loosely used for many varieties of Chinese export blue and white pottery. Strictly defined, it "is distinguished by the arrangement of its ornament into panels; these usually radiate to a bracketed rim notorious for its liability to chip".Vainker, 147 It is a sub-class of Jingdezhen ware, mostly made as "deep bowls and wide dishes", decorated with motifs from nature, in a style not used on wares for the domestic Chinese market.Vainker, 147
The quality of the porcelain used to form Kraak ware is much disputed among scholars; some claim that it is surprisingly good, in certain cases indistinguishable from that produced on the domestic market;Howard, p. 1 of "Introduction;" Crowe, p. 11 others imply that it is a dismal shadow of the truly fine ceramics China was capable of producing.Kerr, p. 38. Rinaldi comes to a more even-handed conclusion, noting that it "forms a middle category between much heavier wares, often coarse, and definitely finer wares with well levigated clay and smooth glaze that does not shrink on the rim..." Thus looking at ceramic production in China at the time from a wider perspective, Kraak ware falls between the best examples and a typical provincial output, such as the contemporary Swatow ware, also made for export, but to South-East Asia and Japan.Rinaldi, pp. 12, 67.
Shapes included Dishware, bowls, and . Kraak ware bowls fall into roughly two types; the first is a deep, unrimmed Chinese style bowl, taking roughly the same shape as the Qing enameled cup ( at left). The second type are called klapmutsen. A klapmuts is somewhat akin to what we would today call a soup-bowl—a broader-based, rimmed style that was new in the Chinese repertoire, and seems to have been exclusively exported to Europe. (Two such examples are at the center of de Heem's Still Life, above: one holds fruit, and the other a shaved ham.)
The specialist Maura Rinaldi suggests that the latter type was designed specifically to serve a European clientele, since there do not seem to be many surviving examples elsewhere in the world, even in the spectacular Topkapı Palace collection, which houses the most extensive selection of Kraak ware of all. Noting the importance of soups and stews in European diet, Rinaldi proposes that klapmusten were developed to satisfy a foreign demand, noting that the heavy, long-handled, metal spoon that is common in Europe would have toppled and chipped the high-walled Chinese bowl.Rinaldi, pp. 11, 118.
File:Porcelain dish from Jingdezhen, Wanli period, HMA.JPG|Jingdezhen, Wanli period
File:Plate, China, Ming dynasty, 16th-17th century AD, porcelain - Museo Nacional de Artes Decorativas - Madrid, Spain - DSC07945.JPG|Dish with figure
File:Bowl, China, late Ming dynasty, Wanli period, around 1600 AD, blue and white porcelain (Kraakporselein) - Ethnological Museum, Berlin - DSC02013.JPG|Bowl, c. 1600
File:MET 19 136 16 O1 sf (cropped).jpg|Bowl, c. 1600
File:MET 19 136 16 Bm sf (cropped).jpg|Last piece from below
File:2015.04.12.00001a.jpg|Kraak porcelain plate 20 cm across
File:Kraak dish. Porcelain decorated with underglaze blue. From 1591-1613 CE. From Jingdezhen, China. Victoria and Albert Museum, London, UK.jpg|Kraak dish. Porcelain decorated with underglaze blue. 1591–1613 CE. From Jingdezhen, China. Victoria and Albert Museum, London
Today a great deal is learned about Kraak ware through excavation of shipwrecks by marine archaeologists. Because the wreck can usually be dated with some degree of certainty, its contents provides a clear snapshot of production at the moment the vessel went down. Moreover, its location can also indicate its destination point, thus revealing much about international trade routes and outposts at the time.Carswell, p. 168. In contrast to the other major European imports of the time (for example textiles or spices), ceramics are able to withstand exposure to water, thus making it the ideal merchandise to serve as Sailing ballast cargo in the great ships.Crowe, p. 20; and Howard, p. 6 of "Introduction." Yet from another perspective, porcelain's durability in this sense, even withstanding centuries of submersion at the bottom of the sea, means that it has been the good that has endured (sometimes even intact) to tell these tales.For a fascinating recent account, brilliantly illustrated, see Jörg, Porcelain from the Vung Tau wreck. A very brief online summary is here: [1]
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