Donor: Rt Hon Malcolm MacDonald

Production Place: China 

Date range: Neolithic to early 20th Century CE

Size of collection: 413 items

The Oriental Museum is home to half of the important Chinese ceramic collections of the British politician and diplomat Rt Hon Malcolm MacDonald, a key figure in the transition from Empire to Commonwealth for the UK and in an important figure in Cold War diplomacy between the UK, China and Southeast Asia. 

MacDonald gifted the other half of his collection to the University of Malaya. This element of the collection was in turn split in two and half given to National University of Singapore upon its creation. As such MacDonald’s collections are foundational for the Oriental Museum, National University of Singapore Museum and the Asian Art Museum of University of Malaya.  The Oriental Museum now has partnerships with both these museums focused on research into this collection.  

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Malcolm MacDonald first visited the Far East in 1929 CE when, as a recently elected MP, he attended a conference in Kyoto.  Already a connoisseur and collector of English pottery, MacDonald’s post-conference travels through Korea, China and Manchuria opened his eyes to the wonders of Chinese ceramics.  It was on this visit that he made his first purchases. 

In 1946 MacDonald returned to the Far East as a senior diplomat.  Although based in Singapore, he travelled extensively throughout the region and began to collect Chinese ceramics in earnest.  .  In 1955 MacDonald was appointed as High Commissioner to India.  Reluctant to move his Chinese ceramics to India, MacDonald turned his attention to finding a museum in the UK which would be willing to accept his collection on loan.  His search led him to Durham’s recently formed School of Oriental Studies.

The MacDonald collection arrived in Durham in 1956, initially on the basis of a 5-year loan agreement. A total of 235 objects were shipped from Singapore, with a further small selection travelling north from MacDonald’s London home.  MacDonald did not however stop collecting, and almost as soon as the collection arrived in Durham he began to add pieces with the aim of creating a fully comprehensive Chinese ceramic teaching collection. In this way the collection almost double in size over over the following years.  With the help of a number of generous donors, the museum was able to acquire the collection in 1969 and it continues to form a cornerstone of our Chinese collections and the backbone of the displays in the gallery named in his honour.  

This is the most extensively studied group of ceramics within the Oriental Museum, but regular discoveries are still made each year by visiting scholars. 

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MacDonald also made important donations to the Oriental Museum's Southeast Asian collections and went on to become Chancellor of Durham University.