Page 44 - Chiense TExtiles, MET MUSEUM Pub 1934

THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART
these robes, a fact which helps to date them as not later
than the Ch'ien Lung period. That is not to say that
paint was never used on pieces earlier than the nine-
teenth century, but the omission of paint on non-picto-
rial k' o ssu is one of the standards of excellence which
was not violated in the best type of work before the
nineteenth century. The psychological and practical rea-
sons why the technique of all the arts fell off in the
nineteenth century cannot be discussed here, but the fact
is, they did, and fell off violent! y. A k' o ssu robe said to
have belonged to the famed Empress Dowager, T'zu
Hsi, for instance, interesting and lavish as it is, is com-
paratively coarse work with a horrid mixture of k' o ssu,
embroidery, and paint. Here the degeneration of work-
manship is almost lost sight of in the bold use of gold
and vivid colors, the sweeping spread of the phoenix
design, and the gay festoons of flowers. It is a perfect
example of the bad taste of the Age of Victoria, which
was the Age of Victoria all the world round, and the
shoddy vulgarities of the period must be considered
symptoms of world evolution rather than the fault of
Victoria in England or T'zu Hsi in China.
The robe shown in figures 5 and 6, also of k' o ssu, is
of a heavier thread and, in design, is quite removed from
the usual imperial court robes, employing instead of the ·
conventional cloud motive background small dragons
and between sixty and seventy different forms of the
shou character. A..
A pair of large k' o ssu panels presented to the Mu-

34