China's porcelain hub is a global kiln

On an upper floor of a modern building, the space opens into a vast and airy studio where sunlight pours through tall windows. This is a working hub for artists from around the world. Scattered across the room are worktables — each one a small universe, with its own rhythm and its own conversation between artist and clay. All of them share the same address: Taoxichuan, Jingdezhen's sprawling cultural district built on the site of the former Universe Porcelain Factory.

On July 25, the Jingdezhen Handicraft Porcelain Industry Sites were inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List, becoming China's 61st World Heritage site and the first centered on porcelain. For the thousands of foreign artists who have settled in this city of 1.62 million people, the recognition came as no surprise.

Jingdezhen in Jiangxi province is home to more than 60,000 jingpiao — artists, designers and creators who have migrated to the porcelain capital, including thousands from more than 60 countries. Since 2015, Taoxichuan has been inviting artists from a variety of countries and regions through its residency programs, offering three-month stays at its international studio to more than 3,600 artists, according to Xinhua News Agency.

Svetlana K-Liee, an artist from Russia who had been living in England since 2006, first came to Jingdezhen three years ago for short residencies. "Each time was not enough," she says. "Finally, after my third residency, which lasted three months, I decided to move here."

Now 49, K-Liee works with porcelain, glass and bronze. On her worktable sits a porcelain art piece. It's a spider with the body of a berry, which is part of her current project. The piece uses traditional Chinese white porcelain and has thick glazes from gas firing. "All the materials I used for it are purely traditional Chinese," she says. "Jingdezhen is an endless source of inspiration and pure, sophisticated materials which I can't get anywhere else. I have discovered many new techniques which were unknown to me previously."

The studio she shares with other resident artists is a microcosm of this global community. Just three days earlier, an artist in her 70s from the Netherlands had been working at the table next to hers for the previous three months. Age, like nationality, seems to matter little in this sprawling space. "We are a multinational group of artists," K-Liee says. "We work here and enjoy not only the work, but the culture."

Apart from porcelain making, she has also embraced traditional Chinese practices such as tai chi, which she practices every morning at 6 am, and acupuncture. "Even my sleep is really good here," she adds. "It shows that my spirit feels really peaceful and happy."

Liliana Diaz, an artist from Mexico, is working on a very different project. Her studio at Taoxichuan is filled with porcelain pieces shaped like brain scans. "The printed piece is the hippocampus," she explains. "This is the part of the brain that is in charge of storing memory."

She sees a connection between memories and the fragments of porcelain buried beneath Jingdezhen. "I have learned that there are many fragments of porcelain and ceramics buried underground, and now they are reaching out and becoming part of the history of the city," she says. "So I'm trying to link that with how we search for our own memories."

For Diaz, cultural exchange is at the heart of her decision to come here. "We come from different cultures with different languages, and we're hungry for new emotions and new knowledge," she says.

Pinar Baklan, a ceramics artist from Turkiye, has been working with porcelain for more than 20 years. This is her first time in Jingdezhen. "I'm happy to be here because we have a very similar culture to China," she says. "We have blue-and-white art like in China, but use a different technique."

The "blue-and-white" she refers to is Iznik ceramics, a Turkish tradition born from the influence of Chinese blue-and-white porcelain that reached the Ottoman Empire via the Silk Road. While visually similar, the two are technically distinct. In Turkish, the word for ceramic is "cini", which means "coming from China". "We tried for centuries to make the same quality as in China," she says.

Baklan sees Jingdezhen's contribution to the world as its ability to bring people together. "You have super deep culture here," she says. "You bring people together to share, which is a really important mission for artists. We have everything to discover here in Jingdezhen."

For all three artists, Jingdezhen is more than a place to work. It is a place to live. K-Liee speaks of the changes she has seen over the past three years. "The town is developing with enormous speed," she says. The UNESCO inscription, K-Liee believes, will only accelerate that transformation. "It's really great to hear that," she says. "Jingdezhen definitely deserves it as it is a unique place on the planet."

For the thousands who have chosen to stay, the city's new status as a World Heritage site is both a recognition of its past and a promise for its future. Jingdezhen's kilns have been firing for over a millennium. In K-Liee's words, "We are still here, still making."