Page 109 - Chinese and japanese porcelain silk and lacquer Canepa

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Fig. 2.3.1.12 Coverlet
Silk satin, embroidered with silk and gilt-paper-
wrapped thread
China, seventeenth century
Dimensions: 213.4cm x 200.7cm
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York,
Rogers Fund, 1975 (acc. no. 1975.208d)
Figs. 2.3.1.11a, b and c Chasuble and stole
and Portuguese markets in the early decades of the seventeenth century. In 1615, from a set of liturgical vestments Right style design. It is believed that each piece of the set was assembled in Europe, possibly
and furnishings Fig. 2.3.1.13 Silk and metallic-thread kesi slit
for instance, Captain Francisco de Medina sent from Manila to Alonso Maldonado tapestry weaving in Spain, where they were lined in linen and cotton, and a cotton fringe was added.
Satin and velvet, floss silk, gold-wrapped thread,
de Torres, priest of Philip III in Madrid, a consignment that included 12 velvet silk cord, cotton, paper (padding) China, Ming dynasty, late sixteenth/early Although the set is said to have had a history of ownership in a small church in Spain,
reposteros (decorative cloths patterned with a coat of arms) from China and 24 velvet China, Macao seventeenth century no documentary evidence has yet been found that supports this attribution.
Ming dynasty, c.1634 Dimensions: 200.7cm x 162.6cm
cushions from China. A few more velvet reposteros were sent that year to Spain by Dimensions chasuble: 108cm x 66cm The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York From six letters written by Francisco Carvalho Aranha, a wealthy man from
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the archbishop of Manila, Don Diego Vázquez de Mercado. On this occasion he sent Irmandade de Santa Cruz, Braga Gift of Amy Greene, 1969 (Acc. no. 69.246) the outskirts of Braga who resided in Macao, which were kept at the archives of the
to Don Pedro de Mercado Vázquez, his nephew and regidor (alderman) of Madrid, a brotherhood of Bom Jesus de São Marcos of the church of Santa Cruz in Braga, we
consignment that included 2 pieces of raw silk and 16 velvet reposteros from China. 379 Discussed and published in Mafalda Soares da learn that the brotherhood wrote to him requesting some ornaments for their church.
The following year he sent him of all the cloths that a priest needed to conduct a mass, Cunha (ed.), Os Construtores do Oriente Português: It didn’t take long for Carvalho Aranha to satisfy this request with a set of liturgical
Ciclo de exposições Memórias do Oriente,
all of silk. According to the documentation, these were specific orders of finished silk exhibition catalogue, Oporto, 1998, p. 317–319; vestments and furnishings. The set, documented as having arrived in Lisbon at the
and José Ferreira da Costa Ortiga, 5 Séculos de
products made by his nephew. Evangelização e Encontro de Culturas, exhibition beginning of 1635, included three altar frontals, a cross cover, a canopy, a pulpit fall,
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There is an interesting set of ecclesiastical vestments made of silk brocade, dating catalogue, Commissariado-Geral. Diocese de two chasubles, two dalmatics, a cope, and other smaller items, all made in white silk
Braga, Braga, 2000, p. 131–133. The chasuble was
to about 1600, which reflects European influence in the Peabody Essex Museum in recently discussed by Levenson, 2009, p. 326, satin and crimson velvet, finely embroidered. It seems clear that the monogram of the
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no. 146.
Salem. A priest’s robe from this set serves to illustrate a striking combination of Chinese 380 Most of the pieces that formed this set have brotherhood, most probably in printed form, was given to the Chinese embroiderers
weaving techniques with both Chinese and European motifs (Fig. 2.3.1.10). The disappeared, were converted into other pieces, or at the time the order was placed as it appears embroidered on two of the few pieces
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were dismantled. Mentioned in Levenson, 2009,
silk weavers created a bright purple silk brocade with a large-scale design of repeated p. 326. The emblem of the brotherhood, a Calvary of the set that still survive intact: a cope and a humeral veil. A chasuble of Roman
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376 AGI, Contratación, 1830, pp. 277–279. Mentioned in
pairs of standing Buddhist Lions confronting each other in front of a brocaded ball, Gasch-Tomás, 2012, p. 56, note 142. and Latin cross, is embroidered within an oval on the type and a stole serve to illustrate how the embroiderers incorporated both Chinese
back of the cope. For a discussion and images of the
framed above and below by a crown, and among scrolls of flowering chrysanthemum 377 AGI, Contratación, 1830, pp. 850–852 and AGI, cope, see Costa Ortiga, 2000, p. 133. and European influences in the creation of this set of vestments (Figs. 2.3.1.11a, b, and
Contratación, 1834, pp. 1052–1055. Mentioned in
and other flowers, all in gold thread. Although the Buddhist Lions and crown resemble Gasch-Tomás, 2012, p. 56. 381 I am grateful to Luís Rufo, President of the c). The chasuble has a crimson velvet orphrey on the front and back embroidered
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Brotherhood of Santa Cruz, for providing me with
European-style heraldry, the background is purely Chinese. While the crown motif is 378 This set of ecclesiastical vestments was previously information and images of the chasuble and stole with an ascending design of stylized flowers organized in the way of candelabra which
dated to c.1660–1665, but it is now believed that for research purposes.
undoubtedly European, the pairs of standing Buddhist Lions are most probably the the set was made in about 1600. I am grateful to 382 This chasuble, together with another chasuble resembles contemporary models used in Europe in about 1600–1620; and the lateral
Karina Corrigan, H. A. Crosby Forbes Curator of
Chinese weaver’s interpretation of a pair of lions in the rampant position (standing on Asian Export Art, Peabody Essex Museum, for embroidered in China in the mid-seventeenth panels of white satin are embroidered with scrolling tendrils terminating in various
century, is discussed by Pacheco Ferreira in
their hind legs), a symbol commonly used in European heraldry. It is not known who providing me with information and images of this Levenson, 2009, pp. 326–327, nos. 146 and 147, small flowers in blue, red and green. While the design of the lateral panels is most
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set of vestments. For an image of various pieces of
ordered the silk brocade used to make this set of ecclesiastical vestments, but it seems the set and the former dating, see Gauvin Alexander respectively. probably based on contemporary European textiles, the rendering of the flowers with
Bailey, ‘Religious Encounters: Christianity in Asia’, in 383 Compare, for example, the flowers embroidered
likely that the silk weavers were provided with a drawing or print for such a heraldic- Jackson and Jaffer, 2004, pp. 120–121, pl. 8.22. in a canopy dating to the Yuan dynasty (1279–1368) shaded areas in contrasting colours appears to be Chinese in style. The stole is similarly
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108 Silk, Porcelain and Lacquer Trade in Chinese Silk 109