Page 139 - Made For Trade Chinese Export Paintings In Dutch Collections

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Figs. 4.46.a. and 4.46.b. In this sense, these images served a propaganda any liquid stronger than tea [...] Then again, a
Sellers of New Years purpose. In order to demonstrate that all was dealer in comic songs, to which, after spreading
accessories and well in his empire, in 1780, during one of his them on the ground, he would call attention by
fireworks, anonymous, inspection tours in Jiangnan, south of the singing one of them in a loud falsetto voice, with
watercolour on paper, Yangtze River, Emperor Qianlong’s vassals gave frightful quavers, which created a great hilarity
1773, 29.9 x 34.2 cm, him an album with exactly these kinds of benign amongst his hearers. [...] There were cobblers
Royer Collection, images. The album, titled Taiping huanle tu patching the veriest of old shoes, tailors at work
Museum Volkenkunde/ (Pictures of peace and joy) was a gift to flatter on garments whose lustre had long disappeared,
Nationaal Museum van the emperor, who was well aware of the saying and regenerators of paper umbrellas, while
Wereldculturen, inv.no. ‘peaceful society – enlightened emperor’. another wove strips of rattan in great round and
RV-360-378-E/5. Returning to the Royer images, it is quite shockingly bad hats. 85
possible that this Taiping-album inspired the
Figs. 4.47.a. and 4.47.b. Chinese painters working on the albums for - Street performers
Funeral/memorial their Dutch commissioner. Many decades later, The performances by itinerant theatre- and
scrolls seller and well into the nineteenth century, the records of acrobatic groups, dangerous-looking sword
women with fish in a William C. Hunter (1812-1891), a resident of dancers and smart jugglers captured the
basket, anonymous, Canton from 1825 to 1870, and a partner in the imagination of Western visitors to Canton.
watercolour on paper, American firm of Russell and Co. in that city for Also, opera performances, with music and lyrical
1773, 29.9 x 34.2 cm, many years, recalled that Canton swarmed with dramas were regular features of Cantonese street
Royer Collection, peddlers. In Bits of Old China, he writes: life. In 1849, the American Osmond Tiffany, Jr.
Museum Volkenkunde/ wrote about a performance that made an
Nationaal Museum van [T]here were sellers of pickled olives, ground impression on him:
Wereldculturen, inv.no. nuts, pastry, tea, congee (hot rice water), with a
RV-360-377-D/4. host of other eatables and drinkables, but never [T]he actors screamed and bawled at the top of
their voices, and seemed to lash themselves into
the most furious excitement. There was a vast
deal of fighting, and on the least pretence, the
heroes of the piece drew their swords and
hacked at each other without mercy; and every
moment the orchestra would come in with an
awful crash, and nearly drive one frantic by the
din of gongs, the squeak of stringed instruments,
and the shrill shrikes of fifes. 86

This spectacle was so different from anything at
home that often it was easier to convey in
pictures than in words. We find these sorts of
images mainly in the collections of major Dutch
ethnographic museums, such as the Wereld-
museum Rotterdam, Tropenmuseum Amster-
dam, and Museum Volkenkunde. See Figures
4.48. to 4.51. and 3.24.
---
85 Hunter 1885, quoted in Ching & Cheng (eds.) 2001, 108.
86 Tiffany, Jr. 1849, quoted in Ching & Cheng (eds.) 2001, 173.