Painted porcelain masters or painting masters come from diverse backgrounds, the earlier practitioners used to learn their trade from their fathers or through apprenticeship from other masters, though some were self-taught. The majority of the painting masters were men, some take orders from factories akin to today’s freelancers, others set up their own workshops of factories and become Lan Tou.
In the early days, the painting master who came from Chinese Mainland typically entered the trade following the rules of Lingsitang, the guild for Guangcai in Guangzhou, and predominantly learnt the trade under tutelage of their fathers. Usually, before they came of age, their fathers would have introduced them to the guild as associate members by paying the fee in silver; they may formally start their apprenticeship only when they came of age. The first three years of apprenticeship mostly involve grinding pigment or outlining the simplest patterns or decorations, sometimes even requires to help their masters in housework or cleaning, apprenticeships typically are paid nominally or even unpaid, lives for them were hard. They could only learn advanced patterns upon completing the apprenticeship. Painting masters are very protective of their personal techniques, and seldom disclose their arts to others, not even their own apprentices, generally believing that they would be out-competed to poverty if they pour out to their apprentices. Most of the painting masters specialize in a few patterns only, very few know a myriad of patterns, those who do learnt them on their own or somehow able to copy the techniques from others. As the society develops in labour protection and training methods, the old way of working slowly fades out.
Lingsitang Record of Father-son Transference: Chan Si-fu, a Lan Tou of Gangcai, and his son Chan King-yui are listed (first column from right of the list). The Chan’s family later come to Hong Kong and work in Peng Chau. (1936, collection of Chiu Ngai-ming)
Painted porcelain masters or painting masters come from diverse backgrounds, the earlier practitioners used to learn their trade from their fathers or through apprenticeship from other masters, though some were self-taught. The majority of the painting masters were men, some take orders from factories akin to today’s freelancers, others set up their own workshops of factories and become Lan Tou.
In the early days, the painting master who came from Chinese Mainland typically entered the trade following the rules of Lingsitang, the guild for Guangcai in Guangzhou, and predominantly learnt the trade under tutelage of their fathers. Usually, before they came of age, their fathers would have introduced them to the guild as associate members by paying the fee in silver; they may formally start their apprenticeship only when they came of age. The first three years of apprenticeship mostly involve grinding pigment or outlining the simplest patterns or decorations, sometimes even requires to help their masters in housework or cleaning, apprenticeships typically are paid nominally or even unpaid, lives for them were hard. They could only learn advanced patterns upon completing the apprenticeship. Painting masters are very protective of their personal techniques, and seldom disclose their arts to others, not even their own apprentices, generally believing that they would be out-competed to poverty if they pour out to their apprentices. Most of the painting masters specialize in a few patterns only, very few know a myriad of patterns, those who do learnt them on their own or somehow able to copy the techniques from others. As the society develops in labour protection and training methods, the old way of working slowly fades out.
Lingsitang Record of Father-son Transference: Chan Si-fu, a Lan Tou of Gangcai, and his son Chan King-yui are listed (first column from right of the list). The Chan’s family later come to Hong Kong and work in Peng Chau. (1936, collection of Chiu Ngai-ming)
