Kiln it — porcelain hub pulls foreign artists

That long continuity may be why Jingdezhen's global appeal today feels less like a newly packaged image than something that has simply taken on a new form.

The cafes, residencies, exhibitions and markets are now part of the landscape. So are the villages, the kiln sites, the clay and the accumulated memory of exchange.

For Read, that pull has always felt personal as much as historical.

This year, he wrote a song about his feelings for Jingdezhen. In its opening lines, he tried to capture what keeps drawing him back:

Your whispering voice echoes in my heart.

I must return.

Like the sun's gravity captures the Earth.

A relentless force of nature.

In spite of ourselves.