Page 74 - AI WEIWEI CAHIERS D ART

Bronze patina of watermelon skin in pale green. Height: 26.5 cm. Musée Cernuschi
Cernuschi, Paris) is covered with a fabric of delicate ornaments. Here again, the edges and tips are detached from the body of the vessel.
Ancient texts speak of an elephant-shaped jug offered by a prince as a wedding gift for his daughter. The elephant is not ornamentation but the shape of the vessel itself; the animal appears transformed by a powerful complexity of forms that further underline its unreal character.
A final example is this wine vase from the Euformopoulos Collection, adorned with a pair of rams. Like all representations of animals in the archaic
period, that of the rams shows that it was subordinate to the solemn laws regulating rite in the construction of the vase rather than being modeled from nature. Unfortunately, our reproductions do not retain the color, thus they are deprived of the immeasurable charm of the patina, this contribution of nature, which, in the eyes of the Chinese, ennobles the work of art.
Alfred SAlmony
Curator of the Museum
für Ostasiatische Kunst der Stadt Köln
66