Decorative Arts
As well as porcelain, a wide range of materials that were more valuable were worked and decorated with great skill for a range of uses or just for display. Chinese jade was attributed with magical powers, and was used in the Stone and Bronze Ages for large and impractical versions of everyday weapons and tools, as well as the bi disks and cong vessels. Later a range of objects and small sculptures were carved in jade, a difficult and time-consuming technique. Bronze, gold and silver, rhinoceros horn, Chinese silk, ivory, lacquer, cloisonne enamel and many other materials had specialist artists working in them.
Read more about this topic: Chinese Art
Famous quotes containing the words decorative and/or arts:
“Mildred Pierce: And just what do you do, Mr. Beragon?
Monte Beragon: I loaf. Oh, in a decorative and highly charming manner.
Mildred Pierce: Is that all?
Monte Beragon: With me, loafing is a science.”
—Ranald MacDougall (1915–1973)
“As the unity of the modern world becomes increasingly a technological rather than a social affair, the techniques of the arts provide the most valuable means of insight into the real direction of our own collective purposes.”
—Marshall McLuhan (1911–1980)