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I think this lovely bowl is Japanese. Can somebody help me understand it better by translating the text on the side and the stamp on the bottom?
Thank you.

Can't help with translation. However judging the blue rim, base and base mark they appear to be printed transfer. You will note the gapes.
Still a decorative item, regardless.
mark@imperial

I'm not up to snuff when it comes to anything poetic, like the first part of the inscription, but the base-mark on your cup (shown upside down) says "Jingdezhen Zhi" (Made at Jingdezhen), meaning it was made in China. The second half of the inscription also has a cyclical date that seems to indicate it was made in the summer of 1942 (renwu/壬午 year) at Zhushan (珠山/Pearl Mountain), another name for Jingdezhen.

There may also be an artist's name in there too, but I can't quite make it out. Perhaps someone else can pick up my slack. This appears to be one of those very thin "papershell" porcelain items, which usually sell for decorative prices. However, if there is indeed an artist's name, it mighthelp jumpstart the value.

Best regards,

Bill H.

Thanks for your input Mark. Can you tell me what you mean by 'gapes' or is that a typo for gaps? I should like to be more accurate when identifying transfers, so any clues much appreciated.

Bill, thanks for the wealth of information you gave. I've swivelled the image around and tried to sharpen it a little in the hope the artist can be identified.

Regards
Jack

The above blue seal is just the base-mark, read from the top right down and across as "Jingdezhen Zhi", "Made in Jingdezhen. The spot I'm stuck on is the third character stack from the left side of the inscription. It's clear enough, I'm just unsure of how to read it. If it's a name, It's probably a given name or nickname. Could refer to the scenery, since the top character looks like 旺/Wang, which means "Blooming".

Best regards,

Bill H.

Many thanks Bill.
I saw another bowl (on eBay) which has the exact same stamp, but the owner had not offered any explanation for it. It looks like it may remain a mystery, but I appreciate all the help you have provided.
Jack

The gaps I posted are about the rim, base and seal mark on your item.
If you look carefully at all three you will clearly see gaps between the paint.
This is transfer printing and not hand painted.
A quick Google search of transfer print versus hand paint will suffice.
Furthermore if you run your finger across print it will be very smooth versus the bumps you will find with hand painted.
I am not trying to be funny or other. But a translation of a seal mark is of no use or value if the said item is printed or other.
I would have thought someone of Bill H expertise would have pointed that out before going into what the seal marks mean or represent.
mark @imperial

To that minority of one who seems to have been reading this thread with closed eyes, in the first couple of sentences of his post, Jack had already referred to the cup's base-mark as "the stamp on the bottom". Clearly, no further explanation was needed about how a "stamp" is a means to "imprint" information. But the painting is by hand, and should the signature prove to be of a known artist, then the value of the piece could be more than just decorative. Question answered within the scope of limitations clearly stated.

And thank you Mark, it's a comfort knowing the forum has a resident shrink.

Bill H.

Translation of the inscriptions,
青山行不盡　緑水去何長
The blue hills are inexhaustible and the green waters are going to grow*
(* This is a citation from the poem titled "Boat Trip on River Zhejiang" from the Tang dynasty poet Cui Hao)
壬午年夏月 - In Summer Month of the Year of Water-Horse (1942)
畦清作　-　Made by Qiqing (At least I read it that way - the first character is very obscure)
於珠山　-　At Zushan

With regards,
I. Nagy

I see what you mean Mark: the 'painting' is broken up on the rim decorations...if this was hand painted the artist would have not left these gaps. Thanks for the information.

I.Nagy, thank you for the definitive translation: it supports what Bill has identified with the addition of the maker. Much appreciated.

Good morning all.

Sorry to prolong this thread, but I have a little confusion.

Bill, your last contribution did not appear until after I has submitted mine and now I have read it, an obvious question arises.

I find oriental ceramics especially interesting and i am painfully aware of how much there is for me to learn. Clearly being able to identify between hand-decoration and transfers is a pivotal skill.

With regards to this bowl, I did, as you say Bill, think the base was a 'stamp' but was in the 'dark' with regards to the decoration. Sometimes I have identified transfers because of some very straight lines which terminate a design (not sure if this is a correct method but it makes sense to me), but this bowl has no such lines. Indeed this bowl has a non-conformity which (in my mind) encouraged me to thinking hand-painted.

So, to resolve my confusion: are the 'gaps' in the rim patterns (as described by Mark) something I can rely upon to represent a transfer or are they simply a POSSIBLY indicator of a transfer where the pattern has failed to adhere to the bowl?

As an aside, now that I.Nagy has identified the artist as 'Qiqing' of Zushan, can anyone say whether this is a known artist? My search hasn't found anything concrete yet.

Thank you for your patience.
Jack.

Yes, transfer-printed decoration often can be identified not only by gaps in the pattern but by asymmetries in repeating patterns, like where an entire scepter head links up to half of another in the middle of the first photo above. In hand-painted borders, the artist makes accommodations so that symmetry isn't spoiled in this manner.

Westerners tend to discount transfer decoration as shoddy, but keep in mind that the Japanese, who have been producing transfer printed dishes since shortly after the method was invented by the Brits in the late 1700s, now consider the process to be an art form. So, when it comes to transfer wares, one person's trash is truly another one's treasure.

I could find no evidence from Google queries that the two characters Qiqing/畦清 were ever used again in a piece of painted porcelain. The only place I found them was split between the first and second elements of some Japanese names, including "Nobuaki Nakano/野畦清作". Mainland China and Taiwan were still controlled by Japan in 1942, the date mentioned in the inscription, but I have no reason to believe this is pertinent to the inscription on this bowl.

Bill H.

That's great Bill, many thanks.
So, on my bowl, the border is a transfer and this is clearly shown by the half sceptre you describe. You said earlier in this thread that the painting is by hand: to clarify, are you referring to the actual scene and poem being hand painted, but the borders being transfers? I didn't realise they were sometimes mixed.
Again, thanks for your patience.
Jack

As far as I know, the mixing of hand painting with transfer content was and still is common. At the simplest, lots of hand-painted Chinese bowls made during the late 19th and early 20th century had stamped-on reign marks, some of them of the period. Also, many ornamentation factories lay down patterns with stamps or other types of transfers and then overpaint them. Depending on the skill of the artist, it may be difficult to tell any difference.

Bill H.

Thank you for your patience Bill, much appreciated.

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