Zhai Guohui baked porcelain in his studio. Xie Li Jing photography
Tangshan, China, February 19 (Xie LiJing Baiyunshui) Chinese proverb "No diamond diamond, don't take care of porcelain work", which is said to be the craft of "curium porcelain". On the 19th, in a corner of the city in Fengnan District, Tangshan, Hebei Province, 58-year-old Zhai Guohui held a diamond in his hand and concentrated on repairing an ancient pastel bottle.
Curium porcelain is the technique of repairing broken porcelain with a metal "curium" like a staple. In the famous Song Dynasty painting "Qingming on the River", there is the figure of curium porcelain craftsman.
Zhai Guohui is repairing porcelain. Xie Li Jing photography
"In the early years, curium smiths carried burdens, walked the streets and alleys, and shouted 'curium pots, curium bowls, curium vats...', and in order to save household use, people let the broken plates and bowls in the home be repaired and used again by the curium smith." Zhai Guohui said that with the improvement of living standards, this skill has gradually faded from the public eye.
Zhai Guohui was originally an antique collector and often went to the antique market with Tibetan friends to "Taobao". In 2009, Zhai Guohui found a set of curium porcelain tools from a hundred years ago. The set of tools is two black wooden boxes with lifting beams, each of which consists of several small drawers and cassettes, which contain a variety of curium enamel utensils and materials, such as diamonds, bows, hammers, curium nails, small benches, etc. It is this set of tools that makes Zhai Guohui extremely interested in curium porcelain.
"The curium porcelain process is complex, and it needs to go through more than ten processes such as punching, sewing, positioning, and curium nails to complete the restoration of a piece of porcelain." Zhai Guohui introduced that for the repair of a seriously broken object, it is necessary to first put the broken part together, wrap it around a few circles with a thin rope to fix it, and then chisel a small piece of copper wire with a small iron hammer into a prismatic two-legged nail, and then use a diamond diamond to carefully drill the holes on both sides of the crack, put the finished curium nails in the drill hole, gently chisel it with a small hammer, and inlay it.
"Curium porcelain has very high requirements for the grasp of strength and scale, and if you are not careful, you may be drilled, and you must find the right depth of the drill hole according to the size of the porcelain, so that the curium nails can be better fixed." Zhai Guohui said.
Zhai Guohui (center) works with his apprentices on porcelain baking techniques. Xie Li Jing photography
For more than a decade, Zhai Guohui has restored hundreds of pieces of porcelain, including ancient porcelain and modern porcelain from the Ming and Qing dynasties and the Republic of China. "Use different styles of curium nails according to the material of the object, or use special curium nails according to customer requirements, so that ceramics, jade, purple sand, glass, etc. can be curium." Zhai Guohui said that every time an object is restored, it is to understand a story and turn "defects" into another unique art of art.
In order to let more people know about this ancient skill, in 2021, Zhai Guohui set up a curium porcelain studio to recruit free people who love curium porcelain craftsmanship, and now there are 6 apprentices. "Curium porcelain carries not only a restoration technique, but also the traditional virtues of thrift and thrift, cherishing things and cherishing blessings handed down by our ancestors, which need to be passed down from generation to generation." Zhai Guohui said. (End)