Bottle with Coiling Dragon

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Archaeological evidence indicates that the kilns near Dehua in Fujian Province on China’s southeastern coast opened in the late thirteenth century and flourished from the sixteenth to the eighteenth. Characterized by thick, lustrous glazes, Dehua wares, both religious figures and items for use on a scholar’s desk, were exported to Europe in the seventeenth to nineteenth century. They are often known in Western writings by the French term blanc de chine, or “China white,” which originated in nineteenth-century scholarship.

Asian Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Met's collection of Asian art—more than 35,000 objects, ranging in date from the third millennium B.C. to the twenty-first century—is one of the largest and most comprehensive in the world. Each of the many civilizations of Asia is represented by outstanding works, providing an unrivaled experience of the artistic traditions of nearly half the world.

Metropolitan Museum of Art