Page 56 - Made For Trade Chinese Export Paintings In Dutch Collections

18-10-2016 21:08 Pagina 55
64 pag:Opmaak 1
roos boek 001-064 f

even if the object itself imposes a limit on the future of the present research corpus appears
possible uses.” 68 Despite the generally high bright and shiny. Surely, this outlook, which
status they conferred on their owners, recognises the ensemble character of these
presumably these paintings were popular among paintings, which perform in their primary mode
different social groups for their own sake, rather of being things, and their bundling across
than for any prestige they may accrue. As different scales, is promising, as the subsequent
researchers, then, we must always be “careful chapters will show. To revert to the model of Ter
not simply to reproduce a set of assumptions Keurs, in which dynamic processes of
about motivation and meaning, while ignoring condensation and evaporation play a role, we
particular situations and needs.” 69 These can expect new material complexes around
motivations and value or meaning accruements them in the times to come. 55
differ from person to person and vary greatly in Hitherto, this chapter analysed the
the dissimilar afterlives of the paintings. mechanisms at work when value accruement
In terms of the materiality of the extensive or dwindling value and meaning construction is
amount of Chinese export paintings in the at stake. I examined the commodity perspective
Netherlands, I argue that the mere existence and disentangled the concepts of visual economy,
of this shared collection, with its size and value, material complex and materiality. One more
has a valuable meaning. The attention to the line must be explored. Because this research
material properties of these artworks as things perspective treats the extant collections in Dutch
qua things, leads us to acknowledge the museums not only as artworks, but also as
exhibited power of their material agency. The commodities – as things – it is necessary to
question that has previously arisen comes to unravel this concept (things) in relation to value
the fore again: what did these Chinese export accruement, more comprehensively.
paintings, as actants, do in their social life? By
standing back from localised, individual Chinese The entanglement of things and people
export paintings, we can better understand their The paintings referred to in this research are
materiality. Indeed, these artworks, approached perceived as valuable and artistic by-products of
in their totality as a unique corpus, do not inhere this China trade with their own position as
in one kind of material, but rather in an things in their own right (qua things) and within
assemblage of various distinctive materials with systems of trade relations and entanglements in
various qualities and aspects ‘bundled’ together. many other fields. They are actants that can
We must think, in respect of Chinese export make a distinction and are able to perform an
paintings, of the different colours and effect or to impose something on reality. What
multifarious media used for depicting the same does the ability of things or Chinese export
subjects with their associated prices, as well as paintings to make a difference consist of? With
of the very different meanings and values they their essential properties and their intrinsic
accrue in the course of time and the rationale power, Chinese export paintings are mediators
behind them, linked to all kinds of aspects of the capable of acting on other existing objects.
historical China trade. In this dimension, which Moreover, they are still of interest to us because
Knappett calls ‘plurality’, materiality emerges they involve us, people.
from interdependent (plural) properties. 70 The As Olsen remarks, we cannot think of
paintings as things are always connected with humans outside the thing-domain, but the
other things. Moreover, underlining the potential opposite option is quite viable. 72 The
and possibilities of things one can understand, archaeologist Olsen, who is a follower of the
materiality art anthropologists Ludovic Coupay symmetrical archaeology approach, gives me a
and Laurence Douny talk of “the ensemble of insightful starting point when concerning how
phenomenal and material properties of things, things “exist, act, and inflict on each other
ensemble conceived as a form of potential or outside the human realm and how this
possibility, recognized through its physical interaction affects human life.” 73 Just think of
and/or conceptual engagement.” 71 Thus, the most Chinese export paintings in Dutch

---
68 Dikötter 2006, 10.
69 Ibid.
70 Knappett 2012, 196.
71 Coupay & Douny, quoted in Knappett 2012, 196.
72 Olsen 2012, 214.
73 Ibid, 213.