NANCHANG, China — The summer rain had only just stopped when Jingdezhen, China's renowned “Porcelain Capital,” began to shimmer under the clearing sky.
At Taoxichuan Ceramic Art Avenue, historic red-brick factory buildings stand alongside modern glass structures, creating a striking dialogue between the city's industrial past and its contemporary artistic identity.
Inside the Taoxichuan Art Museum, one exhibition has attracted particular attention during the 2026 International Academy of Ceramics (IAC) Members Exhibition.
Among the participating artists is Pakistani ceramic artist Muhammad Hassan, whose work brings together two ancient cultural traditions — those of Pakistan's Sindh province and China's Jingdezhen.
“My artworks are a blend of Chinese and Pakistani cultures — half China and half Pakistan,” Hassan said while speaking with visitors near his works. “The relationship between China and Pakistan is like that between brothers, as if the two countries were part of the same family. My creations are a tribute to that friendship.”
Hailing from Nasarpur in Sindh, Hassan is the heir to a pottery-making family with a history spanning approximately 283 years. He has also become the first Pakistani member of the International Academy of Ceramics, marking a significant milestone in Pakistan's ceramic art community.
Since May, Hassan has been working as a resident artist for three months at the Taoxichuan Art Centre in Jingdezhen.
The theme of this year's International Academy of Ceramics Congress — “Heritage and Innovation” — closely resonates with Hassan's own artistic philosophy. For the occasion, he created a series of works designed to bring together the ancient cultural legacies of China and Pakistan.
A Dialogue Between Sindh and Jingdezhen
Hassan's exhibition, titled “The Bond Between Sindh and Jingdezhen: A Dialogue Through Ceramics,” consists of works deliberately divided into two interconnected sections.
One part of each piece incorporates materials and artistic elements associated with Sindh, including local clay, traditional black-dab colouring and motifs inspired by pottery from the ancient Indus Valley Civilisation.
The other incorporates Chinese porcelain, Jingdezhen's distinctive blue cobalt colouring and traditional Chinese ceramic patterns.
“I have also incorporated Chinese calligraphic characters and motifs from the Indus Valley Civilisation,” Hassan said.
“By bringing two cultural heritages together in a single artwork, these creations promote cultural exchange between Pakistan and China and transform pottery into a story of unity, memory and mutual respect.”
For Hassan, the similarities he discovered after arriving in Jingdezhen were particularly striking.
“When I first arrived here, I found many similar cultural symbols,” he said. Symbolic representations of birds, fish and animals can be found both in Chinese art and in the approximately 5,000-year-old cultural heritage of Sindh.
Over centuries, people in both regions developed distinctive artistic traditions around such ancient symbols.
“These shared symbolic languages from antiquity show that our cultures were connected long before modern borders came into existence,” Hassan said.
A Family Legacy in Clay
For Hassan, ceramics is not simply a profession. It is a family inheritance.
He was born into a family of potters whose connection with clay-making traditions stretches back almost three centuries.
After completing high school in his hometown, his life took an unexpected turn when he visited the National College of Arts in Lahore. Members of an inspection team saw his artwork displayed on a wall and offered him a full four-year scholarship.
He completed his undergraduate education and, immediately after defending his final thesis, was invited to join the faculty. Within a week, he had become a teacher of ceramics.
Yet the roots of his artistic journey go back much further.
Hassan recalls that when he was eight years old, his father placed clay in his hands and told him that pottery was not merely a craft but part of the family's cultural heritage and identity.
“He made me promise that I would never forget that I was born into a family of craftsmen,” Hassan recalled.
That promise has remained central to his artistic philosophy.
Jingdezhen: A Living Museum of Ceramics
Hassan describes Jingdezhen as “a living museum of ceramics.”
The city's ceramic heritage is visible far beyond galleries and museums. Street lamps are decorated with blue-and-white ceramic patterns; fragments of porcelain tiles are incorporated into buildings; and even restaurant walls are adorned with ceramic pieces.
“For me, this is proof that local people value their culture, have not abandoned their traditions and remain connected with traditional pottery-making,” Hassan said.
While many contemporary artists increasingly focus on modern ceramic art, Hassan believes that traditional craftsmanship remains the foundation upon which innovation should be built.
“Traditional craftsmanship is our basic foundation,” he said. “If we abandon tradition, it is like forgetting our mother tongue and cutting ourselves off from our roots.”
Clay Without Borders
Looking ahead, Hassan plans to spend the coming year further exploring the combination of the two ancient cultural traditions through his ceramic work.
For him, clay offers a language capable of crossing geographical and political boundaries.
“Porcelain is a shared mother tongue of Pakistan and China,” Hassan said. “Here, I have found cultural brothers with different names.”
“I will use the clay in my hands to tell a story of friendship that transcends borders.”
In Jingdezhen — a city where centuries-old craftsmanship continues to meet contemporary creativity — Hassan's work represents more than a fusion of artistic techniques. It is an artistic conversation between two ancient civilisations, carried forward through one of humanity's oldest creative materials: clay.
