In this area of expertise, we intend to treat a vast and varied artistic universe which for reasons of practicality we usually include under a single heading. All the works produced during the last four millennia by the populations of the vast region of East Asia identified as Zhongguò (Middle Kingdom) and known in the West as China, will come under the title of "Chinese art". We focus on the fragile finds of the so-called Chinese Neolithic (c.8500-c.2500 BC), the extraordinary bronzes of the Shang (c.1600-1046 BC), Zhou(1046-256 BC) and Han (c.200 BC-220 AD), the elegant fictile or metal artifacts of the Tang era (618-907 AD), porcelain, important Buddhist or Taoist sculptures, furniture, paintings, jades and bronze artifacts of the Song (960-1279), Yuan (1271-1368), Ming (1368-1644) and Qing (1636-1912), and in general all those works produced in China for the demanding domestic market such as the refined monochrome porcelain, ducai, wucai, ge, ru, qingbai, and those equally famous for the Middle Eastern or European market as the beautiful white-blue enamels or those, so beloved in the West, the family pink, yellow and black.
