Object
The object is a jade carving of a phoenix, which is part of the collections at the Oriental Museum in Durham. The object consists of eight pieces of carved jade wired together with a form of silver coloured wire. The phoenix is of Chinese origin and most probably formed part of a larger headdress worn by a Chinese woman.
The pieces include the central head and body where the head rises from the centre and is shaped like the head of a bird with a crest. The head also has a circular hole which acts as the eye of the phoenix but would also have allowed it to be attached to the larger headdress. The flat rounded body has two identical circular holes on each side and the wings of the phoenix are attached with the metallic wire through these holes. The body then has three spaced holes around the bottom part and the five tail feathers are attached through these holes. The central feather is marginally larger than the other four and is therefore attached through the central hole alone with the remaining feathers sharing the other holes.
The object is what is known as a buyao which literally translates as ‘shake as you go’ or ‘bounce along with walking steps’. These would usually form part of a larger headdress or an individual hairpin which would have been adorned with many branch-shaped pendants and, according to the name; these would constantly shake or bounce with the wearer’s steps. They were usually made of gold and adorned with pearls and jade
Condition
- Signs of dust and dirt on the surface of the object
- The right wing has become detached with a small amount of wire surviving
- One of the tail feathers is broken
Conservation
A spot test for silver using nitric acid was carried out on the wire fragment from the detached wing. This suggested that the wire was not silver and therefore was less likely to be original to the piece. Following this initial text a sample of the wire was analysed using EDXRF, which confirmed that the wire has a copper core with a tin coating and is thus even more unlikely to be original.
A specific gravity test was carried out on the detached jade wing by weighing it in water and in air and the calculated results suggested the material is nephrite jade. EDXRF results further confirmed that this is nephrite as traces of calcium were found.
The pieces of the jade phoenix were first cleaned using cotton wool swabs with water in order to remove the surface dirt. Areas of tougher dirt were unable to be removed using just water and so a solution of 50:50 water and ethanol with a few drops of Synperonic A7 detergent was used. This was able to remove the tougher residues of dirt and a stiff bristled brush was used for the incised decoration.
In the state in which it was received the wired wings and tail of the phoenix were not bouncy and therefore were not offering a true representation of how the piece would have originally appeared. The wire on the piece was almost certainly not original and although part of the object’s history it was decided to rewire the object to gain the desired effect. The tail feather wire was already coming loose and the detached wing had to have new wire so it was better that the piece was uniform in appearance.
The wire was studied to understand how the piece had been put together and drawings were done to help understand this. All the wire pieces were then undone and the pieces were labelled in separate bags. The original wire was also kept and stored in a bag.
Silver wire was considered as the replacement, but owing to the strength required to maintain the tensions in the piece this was thought to be too soft. Therefore, it was decided to use a silver coated copper wire with a thickness of 0.4mm.
When removing the original wire it was decided that the large twist on the back of the piece may have been how it was connected to the rest of the headdress and therefore it was decided to do a smaller version of this when rewiring the piece.
The original museum label was also removed from the back of the body using hot water to soften the adhesive, and then a scalpel was used to carefully remove it from the surface. This original label was retained and placed in a polythene bag.
The wings of the phoenix were re-attached using the new wire. As the new wire was slightly thicker they were looped around the wing twice instead of three times meaning they were secure and looked more aesthetically pleasing. The tail feathers were then re-wired in an upright position. They were each wired on an individual piece of wire before being connected and twisted together at the back of the piece.
An epoxy resin was used to readhere the broken tail feather in order to provide enough strength to hold the two pieces together. Adhesive was applied to each half of the join, before bringing the two halves together and allowing the adhesive to cure. Any excess adhesive was carefully removed using a scalpel before it had fully cured.