Ceramic Elephant.
Chinese or Vietnamese. Mid-20th century.
Nikon 105mm at f1.4 on a D850 body.
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A Tongzhi Brushpot: Reconsidering a “20th-Century” Attribution.
I bought this small Chinese porcelain brushpot at auction in Thailand, where it was catalogued simply as twentieth century. At 1,200 baht it was hardly presented as an undiscovered Qing treasure. It measures 12 cm high and 7.5 cm in diameter and is decorated in famille-rose enamels
The $250 Bowl: Testing a Possible Middle Ming Blue-and-White Attribution.
I bought this bowl for around US$250 from an older French collector who had lived in Thailand for many years. I did not buy it believing I had discovered an important Ming bowl. His collection contained a considerable amount of nineteenth-century bleu de Huế, together with some clearly
Son Village Chapter 3.
The Farmers. By now, as I wandered around, the reason for the lack of people in Son Village became obvious. Almost everyone was working, many in the fields. Some worked alone, others in pairs or small family groups. From a distance the farmers were often difficult to spot, many hidden
Son Village Chapter 2.
The Elder. A little into my stay in Son village I realised there was one person I had not seen working. Throughout the valley people were already busy. Buffalo moved slowly through flooded rice fields, children carried small bundles between the fields and adults disappeared into the surrounding forest in