Page 13 - China's Renaissance in Bronze, The Robert H.CIague Collection of Later Chinese Bronzes 1100-1900

Casting A Chinese Renaissance

U R N I N G A W A Y F R O M T H E B U D D H I S M of t h e p r e c e e d i n g T a n g
dynasty, the government and intelligentsia of the Song espoused a
T newly resurgent Confucianism and initiated a Chinese renaissance.
Embracing philosophy, music, and the arts, the movement drew its inspi-
ration from the culture of the Bronze Age, that hallowed, formative era of
Chinese history that gave birth to Confucius, Laozi, and many other honored
cultural figures. Made from the Song through the Qing, the so-called later
bronzes 1 are the most eloquent symbol of that renaissance. Cast through
the lost-wax process 2 rather than through the piece-mold technique of
3
antiquity, they were produced in a manner very different from the archaic
ritual bronzes upon which they were modeled; as censers, vases, and imple-
ments for the scholar's desk, they served functions unknown to their ancient
models; in imitating the ancient bronzes' shapes and ornament, however,
they forged a highly visible and symbolic link with the past.
During the Shang, Zhou, and Han dynasties, often called the great
Bronze Age, the Chinese not only introduced bronze casting to northeast
Asia but achieved a level of technical virtuosity unsurpassed even in modern
times, producing exquisite bronzes that delight the eye and document
early technological prowess. The classical culture associated with Bronze
Age China came to a close neither because the art of casting was lost nor
because iron displaced bronze, 4 but because that culture was transformed
by the secularization of late Zhou and Han society, by the dissolution of
empire, by the rapid growth of the Buddhist church following the collapse
5
of Han, and by the arrival of new goods and ideas through ever expanding
trade over the fabled Silk Route.
Differences in religious practices led to the disappearance of many
Shang ritual vessel shapes in the Western Zhou. During the mid- and late
Zhou, increasing secularism bolstered by rising interest in philosophy 6
over religion prompted a further reduction in the number of ritual vessel
shapes, so that by the Han the number of vessel types was limited indeed.
In addition, sophisticated high-fired ceramics began to displace secular
bronzes in well-to-do households during the Han. As the newly prosperous
Buddhist church grew in the Six Dynasties, 7 and as the ranks of the faithful

T H E R O B E R T II. C L A G U E C O L L E C T I O N 9