Spring 2011 Dartmouth College courses
ARTH 60: Arts of China: Classical and Contemporary
This course introduces the major themes, works, and issues in Chinese art history, together with modern and contemporary works to show the origins and continuations of the classical tradition. Each class teaches recent works together with the traditional for a clear understanding of how contemporary Chinese art continues to be influenced by the ongoing five-thousand-year trajectory of Chinese art history. Works covered include prehistoric ceramics, ancient ritual and funerary arts, medieval Buddhist arts, major painters and painting genres, traditional and contemporary architecture, gardens, modern art, Mao-era propaganda, and contemporary art through 2010.
ARTH 16.2 The Forbidden City
Since 1420, the Forbidden City has existed as a cultural and political monument at the heart of China. This seminar examines the City as both a site and archetype in late imperial and modern China, and seeks to determine how its “Forbidden” power continues to evolve in the twenty-first century. The first half of the course will explore the art historical identity of the site as ultimate manifestation of imperial Chinese power from 1420 through 1924, as epitomized in its architecture, art, material culture, and the cultural influences of its most important inhabitants. The second half of the course will interpret the broader theoretical role of the Forbidden City in modern times as an evolving political symbol, a major public international museum, the linchpin of Beijing’s urban design strategy, and a continuing trope in contemporary art, design, and visual culture. Virtual site visits through interactive three-dimensional software will allow us to explore the Forbidden City in person. No previous knowledge of Chinese art history or culture is necessary.
For syllabi, please contact me.
How to Picture a Qing Garden
Last week I presented a paper at “Artful Retreat: Garden Culture of the Qing Dynasty,” a symposium jointly organized by the Peabody Essex Museum and Harvard University in connection with the exhibition The Emperor’s Private Paradise: Treasures from the Forbidden City. Below is the abstract:
“How to Picture a Qing Garden: Engraving Qianlong’s European Palaces”
In 1781, the Qianlong emperor (r. 1736-1795) ordered court painter Ilantai (act. c. 1750-1790) to produce images of the “European Palaces” (Xiyang lou 西洋樓), the Sino-Baroque imperial garden in which Chinese and European architecture and garden design coalesced into an innovative whole. Qianlong was not the first Qing emperor to commission pictures of his gardens, but the resulting perspectival engravings of the European Palaces are unique in Qing garden culture. Reflecting the multicultural style present in both the garden and the eighteenth-century imperial painting academy, the Pictures of the European Palaces and Waterworks (Xiyang lou shuifa tu 西洋樓水法圖) present twenty views of the site using both Chinese and European pictorial techniques to construct the ideal view of each scene.
Although the engravings are not unknown, their biography has long been overlooked in favor of their connection with the European Palaces ruins. How did Qianlong come to choose an obscure academy painter rather than a more well-known artist? Why choose engravings rather than the traditional format of paintings for a garden representation? Why did the engravings take six years to produce? Who was allowed to use the Pictures to picture the garden? This paper reveals the history behind the Pictures’ production to understand not only how to view the engravings themselves, but also how to view the imperial garden they seek to represent, and the emperor whose vision inspired both works.
Highlights of Chinese Art at Asia Week
Pieces from private collections are the focus at Christie’s, including property from the Arthur M. Sackler collection and The Sze Yuan Tang Archaic Bronzes from the Anthony Hardy Collection (both 16 September).
Bronze Wine Vessel and Cover (Fangyi), 12th-11th Century BCE. Estimate: $1,200,000-1,800,000 (Image: Christie's)
The 120+ Hardy bronzes date predominantly to the late Shang dynasty (c. 16th-11th centuries BCE), during the Golden Age of ancient Chinese bronzecasting, and are estimated in excess of $15 million. The sale catalogue (also freely available online as an e-catalogue) includes two very interesting essays: a conversation between Hardy and Christie’s Theow H. Tow (Christie’s Honorary Chairman, Asia and Deputy Chairman, Americas), and “The Four ‘Ps’ in Bronze Collecting” by Jenny So, Chinese University of Hong Kong. So lists the four “Ps” as Precision, Pictogram, Patina, and Provenance, all of which are naturally present throughout the Hardy collection. While the essay focuses primarily on the history and quality of the Hardy collection, it is also a blitzkrieg introduction to the history of Chinese bronze collecting in the West.
Ceramics from the Dr. and Mrs. William L. Corbin Collection from the core of Fine Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art (September 17):
Among the 90 lots of varied material, featuring impeccable and long-standing provenance, the highlights include a rare ‘numbered’ Junyao hexagonal tripod ‘narcissus’ bowl, Yuan/early Ming dynasty, 14th-15th century (estimate: $300,000-500,000). This exceptional vessel, with its milky-blue interior and copper-blush exterior, bears the remains of an imperial inscription on its base which would have given the name of the particular palace in which it was kept. Additional monochrome ceramics include an extremely rare pale celadon-glazed compressed globular jar, Yongle period (1403-1425) (estimate: $300,000-500,000); a very rare Imperial white-glazed deep bowl, Chenghua six-character mark in underglaze blue within a double circle and of the period (1465-1487) (estimate: $300,000-500,000); and a very rare imperial yellow-glazed dish, Chenghua six-character mark in underglaze blue within a double circle and of the period (1465-1487) (estimate: $300,000-500,000).
At Sotheby’s, the sale to watch will be the Joe Grimberg Collection of Chinese Snuff Bottles (September 14). ARTINFO reports that the New Chinese Collector is expected to be a major presence at the sale, both for the lower prices of snuff bottles and the increasing Chinese interest in collecting the objects.
“If you’re not ready to buy an example of imperial porcelain for $10 million, you can go for something that is more affordable,” [Sotheby's specialist Yng-Ru Chen] said. Asked about the possibility of a major turnout of mainland Chinese buyers, Chen said, “I have been spending 75 percent of my time speaking Mandarin.”
Also on offer at Sotheby’s is a Guangxu Period (1875-1908) painting, one of seventeen in Set of Seventeen Paintings Commemorating the Victories of The Muslim Rebellion in the Northwest (est. $120,000-$150,000). Artdaily.org reports that this third panel comes from a private collection, and has been off the market for over 50 years
Two paintings from the same set are currently in the University of Alberta’s Mactaggart Art Collection. This painting’s buyer will need significant wall space: the other paintings from this series in the Mactaggart Art Collection are approximately 1.5 meters (5 feet) tall and 3 meters (10 feet) wide.
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From artdaily.org, events and exhibitions at Asian art dealers:
At the Ralph M. Chait Galleries, 724 Fifth Avenue, An Autumn Feast of Color: Fine Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art will showcase an array of polychrome decorated porcelains and works of art of superb quality from a private collection. One of the highlights is a very rare pair of 18th century painted ivory, jade and hardstone appliqué figures of a court lady and gentleman.
Literati Musing: Inscriptions on Chinese Paintings and Scholar Objects, will be held at China 2000 Fine Art, 434A East 75th Street. Like the contemporary Twitter, ancient inscriptions on Chinese art were the momentary (and now art historically monumental) thoughts about society, relationships, politics, and aesthetics of the literati. Karen and Leon Wender gathered together objects for the scholar’s desk and Chinese paintings that bear inscriptions by eminent scholars and calligraphers of Chinese history. The scholar’s words, literally etched in stone or wood or written with indelible ink on paper, provide clues to where they were at particular times in their lives and offer their knowledge about the object or the painting upon which they inscribe their thoughts. Among the exhibition’s highlights is an Important Scholar Rock Anhui Inkstone with calligraphy by Ding Jing, dated 1750 and a Ming dynasty poem carved onto on a soapstone seal-paste box by Deng Shiru, a very important calligrapher and seal carver from the 18th century.
Kaikodo, 74 East 79th Street, presents Buddhist Lives, which includes Chinese and Japanese paintings from the 14th century to contemporary works featuring images of the Buddha along with stone and gilt bronze Buddhist sculpture. The paintings cover a wide range of styles and subjects, from an early image of Sakyamuni attributed to the Yuan-dynasty painter Yan Hui, to several paintings of lohan dating to the Ming and Qing dynasties to a “Bodhidharma Meditating” by Zhang Daqian painted in the 1930’s. The most recent works include stamped images of the Buddha by Mansheng Wang, who had a successful exhibition at the Today Museum in Beijing this summer, and a photograph by Michael Cherney of a bodhisattva from a Tang-period Buddhist cave printed on xuan paper and mounted as a hanging scroll. Japanese paintings featured in the exhibition include a large and impressive “Neihanzu” (death of the Buddha), Sesshin’s “Daruma,” Isshi’s “Kannon,” and Kano Tanyu’s “Jizo.”
Marble at M D Flacks, Ltd. 32 East 57th Street, will feature small marble treasures including: A Leaf-shaped Tray, circa 17th-early 18th century; a rare 18th century white marble vase, and a rare Censor (17th-early 18th century) that is identical in shape to ceramic and bronze examples from the Ming and early Qing dynasties. According to Marcus Flacks, this is the first time that an exhibition solely concentrated on White Marble, sometimes referred to as Chinese White Jade, has been mounted. “There was a rich tradition of skilled masonry in China and the quality and variety included in this unique show affords us a look into that culture,” Flacks said.
In time for the Forbidden City’s 600th anniversary in 2020, public access will more than double. Not only will visitors be able to see more of the former imperial palace, but physical pressure on the site and its relics will diminish:
The 30 percent of the Forbidden City open to the public – an area of about 216,000 square meters – has an ideal capacity of 30,000 people a day, Shan said. The actual number in extreme cases has been 130,000, with corrosive damage being left on the former home to 24 emperors.
Allowing tourists to visit more of the Forbidden City was a useful means of relieving the pressure, said He Shuzhong, chairman of the Beijing Cultural Heritage Protection Center.
“Endless foot treading makes the stone floor bumpy,” he said. “All that breathed-out air generated by massive numbers of tourists corrodes the buildings. Plus some tourists carve on the relics.
Currently, armchair tourists from around the world can visit the Forbidden City virtually through the Beyond Space and Time project, which will hopefully reflect the changes to the real site. Certain areas, such as the Qianlong Garden, will likely continue to remain restricted. But in September, 105 relics will make their global debut in the US, at the Peabody Essesx Museum.
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*ARTINFO China published a list of Beijing’s art-world power restaurants that bears an all-too-striking resemblance to a Sohu.com list of Beijing’s artist-run restaurants published five days earlier. Both articles could have benefited from some fact-checking: although I’m not in Beijing right now to confirm it in person, Chinese art critic Phil Tinari pointed out that Ai Weiwei’s “Qu Na’r” has been closed since 2008. But despite these gaffes, ARTINFO China also published a good resource last week: their pick of the top ten Chinese artists websites.
*Chinese contemporary art comes full circle, from its opening days at NAMOC to a retrospective of the past thirty years.
*The catalogue for Christie’s New York Chinese art sale (September 16) is now online.
*Yishu Journal of Chinese Contemporary Art launched its online archive and named Maya Kovskaya and Sheng Wei the first recipients of the Yishu Awards for Critical Writing on Contemporary Chinese Art.
*A legion of stone figures found in Hunan’s Guizai Valley not only outnumber Qinshihuang’s warriors, but some also predate the terracotta army by 2500 years.
Forbidden City relics to debut in US (video)
The Global Times reported yesterday on an upcoming exhibition of Forbidden City relics that will make their public debut in the U.S. in September. The Emperor’s Private Paradise: Treasures from the Forbidden City includes 105 relics from the Emperor Qianlong’s (r. 1736-1795) retirement compound in their first public showing either in China or outside it.
This world-exclusive show offers rare insights into the private life of this emperor:
“This is the first time that we have sent out Qianlong’s furniture and daily-use items, which reveal more about his leisure time rather than of him as a political figure,” Wang told the Global Times.
But why will the luxuries be seen abroad before ever being displayed at home? Wang explained, “The exhibition is not an inter-government program, it’s more like a commercial project. The World Monuments Fund (WMF) started cooperating with us on the restoration of the Qianlong Garden in 2007. The whole restoration budget is about 200 million yuan ($29.44 million), and the WMF funded almost half.”
The Qianlong Garden is still formally closed to the public, and there is currently no plan to exhibit the relics after their US museum tour. Some believe the relics should be exhibited in China first:
“Luxuries like that shouldn’t be taken to foreign countries first,” said Cao Guoliang, who works for the Beijing Eastern Chemical Works. “It’s just like taking a Chinese movie to a foreign film festival before playing it in a Chinese cinema. How weird is that?”
But the Palace Museum believes that a foreign debut is important to show not only the relics, but also the international cooperation that went into the conservation and protection of these rare and important works.
“The Emperor’s Private Paradise” runs 14 September 2010 to 9 January 2011 at the Peabody Essex Museum, and will then travel to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the Milwaukee Art Museum in Wisconsin.
*Full disclosure: I’ll be speaking at the exhibition’s symposium, “Artful Retreat: Garden Culture of the Qing Dynasty,” Nov. 12-13, 2010.
Another altercation for Ai Weiwei: Chinese art news, 9-15 August
Ai Weiwei claimed last week that he was attacked by police in Chengdu while trying to report last year’s attack by security forces that left him hospitalized for internal bleeding. In the midst of the scuffle, a mobile phone camera was in use, although the portly plainclothes policeman in green certainly did his best to block it.
Clearer footage was taken at a distance by independent filmmaker Alison Klayman, who is is currently directing “Never Sorry,” an independent documentary about Ai Weiwei produced by MUSE Television and AW Asia coming in 2011.
McClatchy bureau chief Tom Lasseter commented on the incident:”This is the world of Ai Weiwei, and it may literally be a unique one in China these days – a combination of performance art and something like a Socratic sense of patriotism. Whatever one thinks of Ai, it’s beyond dispute that his very public calls for transparency and accountability are unusual in a country noted for its authoritarian tactics.”
Ai Weiwei’s upcoming installation as part of the Unilever Series at the Tate Modern’s Turbine Hall opens October 12.
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A list of top ten shows to see in Beijing includes Gulou Dong Dajie, likely the next Old Beijing casualty in the gentrification process.
The MFA Houston commissioned Cai Guo-Qiang to create one of his trademark gunpowder drawings.
Julien’s Auctions announced its first-ever pop culture auction in Asia, including objects from Michael Jackson, Lady Diana, and Bruce Lee
Yin Jinan: the strange map of Chinese contemporary art (in Chinese).
Shan Jixiang, head of China’s State Administration for Cultural Heritage, says that the frenetic pace of development is destroying cultural heritage.
What’s special in China’s special zones? Jiang Jun for ArtHub Asia.
China makes an “appointment” with the Venice Architecture Biennale: unveiling the concepts behind the Chinese pavilion.
Chinese art and buyers feature prominently in Christie’s first half success of $2.57 billion.
As Newsweek reports that the Chinese artist makes the brand, the “artketing” partnerships between contemporary Chinese artists and major international brands seem more like standard practice than simply a trend.
Guy and Myriam Ullens: Chinese art news, July 17-25
As Guy and Myriam Ullens continue to receive increasing press coverage for the sales of their top-notch classical collection, they are again in the news again thanks to their loan of Yuan dynasty painter Wang Zhenpeng’s (act. 1280-1329) 1328 handscroll Glimpses of Grandeur: Vista of the Yuan Landscape to be exhibited at the Baur Foundation’s Museum of Far Eastern Art in Geneva. The founders of the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art (UCCA), they are also actively encouraging Chinese contemporary art, most recently with contemporary female artist Yu Hong’s “Golden Sky” and Zhang Huan’s “Hope Tunnel” currently on display there.
The BBC World Service interviewed artist and architect Ai Weiwei, whose work will soon appear in the Unilever Series at the Tate Modern.
Chinese civilization – complete with written characters, bronzeware, and cities – may have begun around 4200 BCE, 500 years earlier than scholars originally believed.
The Today Art Museum might be the place to find the next Hot Young Chinese Contemporary Artist as s/he “transitions from student to society.”
What is ink painting the 21st century? Liang Quan responds.
Contemporary calligrapher Jeanyee Wong celebrated her 90th birthday by speaking about her art form.
Taiwanese artist Ju Ming’s “Living World Series” displays his large-scale sculptures in a solo exhibition at Beijing’s National Art Museum of China (NAMOC). Also at NAMOC right now are Zhong Zhangfa’s contemporary ink landscapes and Zhou Shunkai’s history paintings, calligraphy inspired by the Poyang Lake region, and 70+ paintings by Yunan artist Shu Jianxin.
All 1000 shares of China’s first publicly traded art portfolio may have sold out, but Jing Daily believes it is important that these portfolios diversify toward more multi-million-dollar “blue-chip” artists.
“Tradition Transformed” at the Rubin Museum of Art presents the first US exhibition of contemporary Tibetan art.
