《苍木凝韵》"Cang Mu Ning Yun"!, 206.5ml, *Ta Xi Ye Shan Hong Zong Zi Ni 台西野山红棕紫泥, with Engraving of Pine, Bird and Poem, by Craftsman Yang Pin Ting 杨聘婷。
《苍木凝韵》"Cang Mu Ning Yun
Engraving of the famous poem from Tang Dynasty's Famous Poet, Wang Zhi Huan in his composition, "Ascending the Stork Tower"
"欲穷千里目，更上一层楼。"
出自唐代王之涣的《登鹳雀楼》
"To see the scenery a thousand miles away, one must climb one more story."
This line expresses the poet's boundless desire for exploration. While it seems to simply describe the process of climbing the tower, its meaning is profound. This line is often used for self-encouragement, indicating that only by reaching a higher realm can one gain a broader perspective.
Ta Xi Ye Shan Hong Zong Zi Ni 台西野山红棕紫泥
Our uncle Mr Zhang Yun Long, a deep YiXing historian and ZiSha clay specialist responsible for firing our pots (he asks for your understanding that Fully-Handmade ZiSha works are never perfect, with surface occasional irregularities), and here with granny! Uncle Zhang is Senior Master Cao Lan Fang's husband. We say a big hi and thank you to you friends!
Craftsman Yang Pin Ting welcomes your fervent support for, and USE of truthful and hard-worked Fully-Handmade ZiSha Art.,
Yang Pin Ting loved this pot which our aunt Senior Cao Lan Fang had designed for her a year ago, and in their joint notes for this work:
"苍劲古木汇聚山林清雅气韵。寓意松柏风骨长存
~ The ancient trees and woods, with their sturdy and vigorous trunks, exude a refined and elegant charm, reflecting the tranquil spirit of the mountains and forests, and symbolise the enduring spirit and resilience of Pine and Cypress."
and they gave this work the name:
《苍木凝韵》
They wanted to convey the reminiscing and the atmosphere, of living in wooden houses, deep in naturalness, amongst the ancient trees. This time, Craftsman Yang is the crafter herself! Our Family gave her our Family's Tai Xi Ye Shan, Hong Zong Zi Ni, and Yang practised on it for two months, after testing pieces, failures at the kiln, has now familiarised herself with the clay.
Presenting in Hong Zong Zi Ni, the Cang Mu Ning Yun work:
Minimal tree-like embellishments adorn three areas: the spout, the lid knob and the handle.
Lid Knob,
Handle,
The slightly raised neck, is to give this work the aura of vertical axial strength as befits the towering bamboos in our FAMOUS YiXing Bamboo Forest, conveying the strength of the thick bamboo stems.
With a “woody” feeling, Senior Master Cao trained and have Yang Pin Ting to engrave the Pine woods and the bird perched on the branch,
1) The wood features on the spout, the lid knob and the handle,
2) The strong neck reminiscent of a thick bamboo stem, and,
3) The Pine tree engraving, bring to us, the peace and imagery of reclusive living in nature.
Enjoy the teas, say Cao Lan Fang and Yang Pin Ting, they wish you love this new creation, in the versatile Tai Xi Hong Zong Zi Ni!
Craftsman Yang wishes all of you friends, a hearty journey with the best teas steeped in Fully-Handmade ZiSha works!
Senior Master Cao Lan Fang and our QC Chief Craftsman Yi Xiao Ran have managed to bring Craftsman Yang Pin TIng to join us! Born 1996, and started learning the Craft of Fully-Handmaking ZiSha Art at twelve years of age. It was until 21 years of age that she started crafting Fully-Handmaking ZiSha teapots as her profession, after graduation at Wuxi University, and fighting as a livelihood doing purely Fully-Handmade ZiSha work. All by herself alone, and being heavily disillusioned for the past decade due to the worrisome landscape of Fully-Handmade ZiSha Art and Craft being tainted by falsity, duplicity and chicanery. She has been having a tough time in the past decade, despite her churning out intricate and elegant pieces in her own curated portfolio of works! AND NOW, WE ARE SO HAPPY for her, and for her love of the Art to continue strongly with our team work. Now, she joyously continue her path of dedication to serve all of you dearest Friends, the dearest Friends who are the guardians of the other half of our beloved journey of tea: Fully-Handmade ZiSha Art.
She now crafts alongside Craftsman Zhang Huan, Zhu Shu and Yi Xiao Ran in our small studios besides the River Li 蠡河 Shu Shan 蜀山!
Dearest Friends, here we grandly welcome you to another of our Cao Family's clay: * The Tai Xi Ye Shan Hong Zong Zi Ni 台西野山红棕紫泥 *
Being a very special type of Zi Ni in our Cao Family's vault (we have 22 warehouses of ZiSha clay, and also several open facilities to weather down ZiSha governed by our Uncle Cao An Xiang), we love this Zi Ni clay as it thrives in all types of teas once well seasoned in any tea.
What is "Ye Shan (Wild Hill)"?
Huang Long Shan has several quarries, notable amongst them e.g. 4th Quarry, Tai Xi quarry, Da Shui Tan, Bao Shan quarry.
Next to the Tai Xi quarry, there is another second quarry lying adjacent, and we YiXing people affectionately call Tai Xi Ye Shan "Wild Hill", although it is STILL part of Huang Long Shan.
In Li Hong Yuan and Zhu Ze Wei's books on ZiSha, this ore/clay type is documented, recorded very clearly and succinctly as well,
The Tai Xi Ye Shan Hong Zong Zi Ni.
"矿: 含有一定量的白色云母碎片.
烧成后呈紫棕红色调, 胎质颗粒质感较好, 但外观色泽纯度略差。"
MEANING:
The Ore: significant presence of WHITE MICA pieces! After firing, it presents in purplish~brown~red colour tones, the sandiness/graininess is very good, and the appearance highly heterogeneous.
Shrinkage of Fully-Handmade ZiSha works:
Here are Craftsmen Zhu Shu, Zhang Huan and Yang Pin Ting! All dedicated, committed and hardworking, tirelessly preparing and bringing to all of you dearest friends, delightful ZiSha Artworks for all of you! Our Cao Family is delighted to have these three giants with us, happily in this team here in YiXing besides the River Li 蠡河 at Shu Shan 蜀山!
~~~~~~~~~~
Fully-Handmade ZiSha works:
Hold one, hold up one, swing her work around. Carefully examine her Fully-Handmade work. Look at it from afar, from near, and it will grow on you. The whole piece grow on you because 1) she takes reference from what the Senior Masters chose for her, 2) and she amazingly crafts them up EXACTLY as to what the Senior Masters want from him: extreme fine detailing with MUCH THOUGHT on each part, with MUCH TIME spent on every part, section. Because this is what Fully-Handmade ZiSha Art should be, and HOW FULLY-HANDMADE ZISHA ART is so different from and light years ahead of the ubiquitous jigger-machined pots and half-handmade pots masquerading under the sales tagline of "fully-handmade zisha" pots. These latter JM/HHM pots are made in what we call 流水线 a.k.a. 'Factory-Line operation' whereby the main pot body after being jigger-machined or coming off from the mould, is passed to the next worker who fits on the spout, and subsequently this second worker will pass the pot on to another worker who will in turn fit on the handle. Continuing so, the pressed lid is likewise passed to another worker who fit on the lid knob. EACH WORKER has NO IDEA what the other one is doing, and they are always working on fixed time lines stated by the boss. For example, the worker being "passed the baton" a pot with the spout just fixed onto the body by his colleague, will only focus on fixing on the handle, with nil to little regard to WHETHER THE HANDLE fixed on will be cohesive with the spout. Each worker has NO idea of HOW THE FINAL POT WILL LOOK LIKE. Beyond poor craftsmanship and clay, the result of such processes are ugly pots with poor cohesiveness which experienced Artists, Craftsmen and collectors will tell from a metre away. Experienced people in us, do not need to pick up a pot to check whether it is fully-handmade or made of zisha, we can tell from a metre away just by looking at the pot.
~~~~~~~~~~~~
The keywords are: Detailing and Cohesiveness.
A GOOD Fully-Handmade ZiSha Work combines great detailing and cohesiveness.
~~~~~~~~~~~~
