For four decades, [Artisan Name] has been throwing celadon in Longquan — the town where the craft was born 1,700 years ago. His workshop sits on a hillside overlooking the kiln that has fired every piece he has made since he was nineteen.
The celadon glaze is the hardest part. It is made from local clay and wood ash, fired in a reduction kiln at 1,280°C. The temperature must be held within a 20-degree window for six hours. Too hot, and the glaze turns grey. Too cool, and it turns brown. The jade green — the colour that made Longquan famous — exists in a narrow band between the two.
'People ask me how I know the glaze is right,' he says. 'I don't know. I feel it. After forty years, my hands know the difference between a good firing and a bad one before I open the kiln.'
His son joined the workshop five years ago. The technique will continue. But [Artisan Name] is clear about one thing: 'He must find his own way. I can teach him the process, but the feeling — that takes years.'