Here is another antique Chinese pot I picked up a while ago. I thought the recent information I found about it would be interesting. The pot was made well over 100 years ago, and is middle crossing. The clay is very rough and rugged, and has drainage holes over 2″ wide! The decorative chop is “翼記” and reads “Yoku Ki”. It measures 14.5 × 10.3 × 4.1 cm. Antique Chinese pots of this size, that are perfect for medium shohin Black Pines and Shimpaku, are tough to find, most Antique Chinese pots around for sale are very large, as big trees were the style back then.

Bottom showing unique oversize holes and stamp.
The most interesting thing I found about this pot is its provenance. While idly thumbing through some old blog posts, I discovered my pot in an old blog post by one of my favorite bloggers in Japan! High end bonsai pottery is a small world indeed!
You can see the blog post here, and I highly recommend checking out the other posts, it’s a great blog and full of information about bonsai and pottery, featuring photos of fantastic trees and pots.

http://ssbin.blog.shinobi.jp/Entry/35/

Hope you enjoyed another great pot. I’ll be doing another post on some interesting pots Monday, and stay tuned for a complete Hanko and Rakkan database page, I hope to have it completed by the middle of January, featuring more than 300 chops, stamps, and signatures from Japanese and Chinese potters and Kilns. Until then, feel free to email me with any pottery questions at Gastrognome@aol.com