Bronzes, Clay Soldiers and Porcelain

Some of China's greatest art is in bronze, clay and porcelain. Three examples span three thousand years.

Looking closely: A Shang ding. A round bowl stands on three legs, with two upright handles on the rim. Around the body runs a band of tight, low-relief ornament on a ground of fine spirals; such bands often hold the taotie, a face of two staring eyes, built of animal forms, whose meaning is still debated. Vessels like this held food offered to ancestors in ceremonies, and they were buried with the elite. The green is the color bronze turns after centuries underground. Shang casters did not use lost wax: they built clay molds in sections around a core, carved the ornament into the molds and poured the bronze in.

Looking closely: The Terracotta Army. In 1974 farmers digging a well near Xi'an struck the first of an army buried to guard the tomb of the First Emperor, who united China in 221 BC and died in 210 BC. Archaeologists estimate about 8,000 life-size soldiers in the pits, with horses and chariots, standing in ranks. This one wears a coat of armor made of small plates; his hair is tied in a topknot. The figures were once brightly painted, and most of the paint flaked off after excavation.

Looking closely: A Ming jar. A sturdy round jar, white as snow, with a scaly blue dragon chasing through clouds around its body and a band of lotus panels at the base. Porcelain is made of a fine white clay called kaolin mixed with china stone and fired at about 1,300 °C, until it is hard, white and glassy. The blue is cobalt, painted under a clear glaze. At Jingdezhen, whole towns of workshops made porcelain for the court and for export across Asia, the Islamic world and, later, Europe, where people simply called it "china."