Page 50 - China, 5000 years : innovation and transformation in the arts

musical instruments, which he had collected and
had scholars catalogue for him. His catalogue of
calligraphy gave pride of place to the same
calligraphers esteemed for centuries by the literati.
After Huizong and his son Qinzong had been 3. See K.C. Chang, Art, Myth,
captured by the Jurchens and a new Song court and Ritual: Tlie Path to Political
established at Hangzhou (in 113 8), the new Authority in Ancient China
emperor, Gaozong (r. 1127-1162), made concerted (Cambridge: Harvard
University Press, 1983),
Heefforts to gain the support of the literati.
pp- 95-97; Wu Hung,
directed his court artists to produce works on
Monumentality in Early Chinese
historical or classical subjects that served to Art and Architecture (Stanford:
associate his court with China's cultural heritage. 22 Stanford University Press,
1995), pp. 4-12.
Gaozong himself was a highly accomplished
calligrapher and often made gifts of pieces of his 4. See A.C. Graham, Disputers
of the Tao (La Salle, 111.: Open
calligraphy to favored officials. He brought Mi Court, 19S9), pp- 232-34.
Youren back to court and had him serve as the 5. On Mozi's and Guanzi's
curator of the palace painting collection and court
painter. Art, thus, had become a site for earning the political thought, see Kung-
support and respect of the literati.
Achuan Hsiao, History of
There is a strong tendency in Chinese thought to Chinese Political Thought, trans.
rank unity or oneness above disunity, to assume the F.W. Mote (Princeton:
superiority of consensus over disagreement, of Princeton University Press,
1979), pp. 235-43,322-26.
Weuniformity over diversity. need to understand
6. Translation from Patricia
this frame of mind, but we do not need to Buckley Ebrey, ed., Chinese
subscribe to it. Even if Huizong and Zhu Xi would ACivilization: Sourcebook, 2nd
have each agreed that the world would be a better ed. (New York: Free Press,
place if all thought as he did, much of the vitality 1993), pp. 33-37.
and creativity in Chinese culture derives from the 7. See Mark Edward Lewis,
fact that such unification of thought was beyond Sanctioned Violence in Early
China (Albany: State University
the capacity of either of them.
of New York Press, 1990),
pp. 174-212.
8. See Isabelle Robinet,
Daoism: Growth of a Religion,
trans. Phyllis Brooks (Stanford:
Stanford University Press,
1997), pp- 30-32,46-
NOTES 9. Burton Watson, trans., The
1. The existence of opposed Records of the Grand Historian of
China (New York: Columbia
tendencies in Chinese thought University Press, I96i),p. 57.
has long been recognized. See
the classic article by Benjamin 10. On Chinese ideas about
Schwartz, "Some Polarities in the sacred powers of mountains
Chinese Thought," in and their expression in Chinese
art, see Kiyohiko Munakata,
Confucianism in Action, ed. Sacred Mountains in Chinese Art
(Urbana: University of Illinois
David S. Nivison and Arthur E Press, 1990); Lothar
Wright {Stanford: Stanford Ledderhose,"The Earthly
Paradise: Religious Elements in
University Press, 1959). Here, Chinese Landscape Art," in
Theories of the Arts in China, ed.
because my focus is on Susan Bush and Christian
Murck (Princeton: Princeton
connections to art, I have University Press, 1983), pp.
selected a rather different set of 165-83; and John Hay, Kernels
ideas than Schwartz did. of Energy, Bones of Earth :Tlie
Moreover, I do not see a larger
system that comprehends all of Rock in Chinese Art (New York:
China House Gallery, 1985).
the polarities, but a much
messier situation in which
inconsistencies and even
incoherence are not only
possible but an accepted part of
the way things are.
2. See James Legge, trans., Tlie 11. Robinet, p. 95.
Chinese Classics IILJlie Shoo
King (Hong Kong: University On12. this topic, see also K.C.
of Hong Kong Press, i960; Chang, Art, Myth, and Ritual,
pp. 81-94; Derk Bodde, Chinese
reprint of Oxford University Thought, Society, and Science: Tlie
Press ed.), pp. 283-85.
THE INTELLECTUAL AND RELIGIOUS CONTEXT OF CHINESE ART
Intellectual and Social Background 20. See Susan Bush and Hsio-
of Science and Technology in Pre- yen Shih, Early Chinese Texts on
Modern China (Honolulu: Painting (Cambridge: Harvard
University of Hawaii Press, Yenching Institute, 1985),
1991), PP- 26-31. pp. 196-234, passim.
13. Translation from Ebrey, ed., 21. See James M. Hargett,
"Huizongs Magic
AChinese Civilization: Marchmount:The Genyue
Sourcebook, p. 31. Pleasure Park of Kaifeng,"
Monument Serica 38 (1988-89),
14. See Robert H. Sharf, "The pp. 1-48.
Scripture on the Production of
Buddha Images," in Religions of 22. See Julia K. Murray, Ma
China in Practice, ed. Donald S.
Hezhi and the Illustration of the
Lopez, Jr. (Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 1996), pp. Book of Odes (New York:
261-67. Cambridge University Press,
15. See Patricia Ebrey, "Portrait 1993)-
Sculptures in Imperial
Ancestral Rites in Song
China" T'oung Pao 83 (1997),
pp. 42—92, andT Griffith Foulk
and Robert H. Sharf, "On the
Ritual Use of Ch'an
Portraiture in Medieval
China," Cahiers d' Extreme-Asie
7 (1993-94), PP- 149-219-
16. For an overview ot the
religious and philosophical
situation in Song times, see
Peter N. Gregory and Patricia
Buckley Ebrey, "The Religious
and Historical Landscape," in
Religion and Society in T'ang and
Sung China, ed. Ebrey and
Gregory (Honolulu: University
of Hawaii Press, 1993),
pp. 1-44.
17. For a good example, see
Robert M. Gimello, "Chang
Shang-ying on Wu-t'ai Shan,"
in Pilgrims and Sacred Sites in
China, ed. Susan Naquin and
Chiin-fangYii (Berkeley:
University of California Press,
1992), pp. 89-149-
18. For recent overviews of
Song court art, see Craig
Clunas, Art in China (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 1997),
pp. 53-63, and Wen C. Fong,
Beyond Representation: Chinese
Painting and Calligraphy S,h—14 th
Century (New York:
Metropolitan Museum ot Art,
1992), pp. 173-245-
19. See Lothar Ledderose, Mi
Fu and the Classical Tradition of
Chinese Calligraphy (Princeton:
Princeton University Press,
1979) and Peter Charles
Sturman, Mi Fu: Style and the
Art of Calligraphy in Northern
Song China (New Haven: Yale
University Press, 1997).