In September2018, Jingzhou Museum officially started the Painted Pottery Conservation andRestoration Project to restore 140 pieces of painted potteries in itscollection. More than a year later, how are the painted potteries restored? Anysurprises?

Walking into thePottery Restoration Room of the Preservation Department of Jingzhou Museum, themost impressive thing is the scattered pottery shards. These shards, matched,reinforced and glued together by a restorer, will become integral pieces ofpotteries with different shapes.

After years of archaeologicalexcavations, a large number of fine potteries unearthed in Jingzhou, all ofwhich are collected in Jingzhou Museum. In particular, part of the paintedpotteries, with exquisite and decoration and fine technology, has a highresearch value and artistic value. However, due to the serious decay, cracking,peeling of decoration, warping of painting, soil adhesion, early improperrestoration and other damages of the utensils when unearthed, the utensilscould not meet the needs of display and scientific research. In September 2018,Jingzhou Museum officially started the Painted Pottery Conservation andRestoration Project to restore 140 pieces of painted potteries in itscollection.

Compared withplain pottery, the restoration of painted pottery is more complicated. It isknown that there are two types of pottery bodies for painted pottery fromWarring States Period to the Western Han Dynasty, namely, gray and brown. Thedecorative patterns have moire, diamond, roll moire, dragon pattern, etc. Interms of color, red, yellow and black, white, and gray are used alternately,forming a comparative and unified artistic effect. Therefore, when restoringthe utensils, we mainly clean, reinforce, match and glue, complete and paintingthem. The surface cleaning and painting reinforcement of pottery are the mostdifficult tasks in the restoration.

More than a yearlater, more than 90 pieces of painted potteries have been restored. They aredivided into burial objects, storage objects and objects of daily use, mostlyDing (an ancient cooking vessel), Fu (a square grain receptacle used atsacrificial ceremonies in ancient times), Dui (grain receptacle), Lei (anancient urn-shaped wooden wine-vessel) and kettle. It is worth noting that, amongthe restored painted potteries, there is a ceramic censer of Western HanDynasty with unique shape and unique pattern.

According to thepreliminary estimate of the project team, all these painted potteries will berestored by the end of 2020.