Page 349 - Art In The Age Of Exploration (Great Section on Chinese Art Ming Dynasty)

through almost thirty years of profound study reach full understanding of these supreme ele- sculpture was a minor tradition; again, the por-
in China (1583-1610), was able to penetrate ments of Chinese art only with long study and traitists were mostly unknown figures who
these dimensions of Ming life; no foreign envoy cultivation. Even without such expertise, practiced a craft, not held to be artists of signif-
passing through could have done so. however, we can grasp the elements —the evoc- icance. The contrast with Renaissance Europe
If Columbus had brought along missionaries, ative power of the poem or the inscription, the could scarcely be greater. To be sure, we have
they are not likely to have possessed the quali- line and movement of the calligraphy, the way portraits of the Ming rulers and their consorts
ties of Ricci and his colleagues a century later. in which the inscription and its calligraphy (cat. 283), but only because those were needed
And even the remarkable Jesuits, imbued with complete the painting. The inspired union of for the rituals of the imperial ancestral shrines.
powerful new currents of learning that marked those "three perfections" (san jue) represents They were not painted to be viewed and
the age of Galileo in Europe, and for their time the highest level of Chinese aestheticism. admired by any sector of society. Stylized por-
radical in accommodating to the cultures of Asia One of the most interesting differences traits of other members of the Ming elite exist
in order to convey their Christian doctrines, had between the place of the arts in European and for analogous reasons. A few real and remark-
scant success as evangelists in the two or more Chinese societies is embodied in their respec- able portraits of Ming personages (cat. 310),
centuries following Ricci's arrival in China in tive definitions of the high arts, as differenti- some by eminent painters, show that the skills
1583. But the streets full of well-dressed people ated from the artistic crafts. Another is revealed of portraiture were present. Yet such portraits
of all classes, the shops full of foods and craft in the composition of the two artistic communi- are rare. Human figures in Ming paintings are
products in a variety unknown to Europe, and ties, East and West, and the relationship of mostly adjuncts of landscape scenes. Paintings
the bustling, stable life of the entire society those to their societies at large. in which human figures are the central sub-
surely would have impressed Columbus deeply. The Chinese held calligraphy, poetry, and jects—city street scenes, genre paintings, depic-
He might have thought China poorly defended, painting to be the most important of the high tions of Buddhas and demons, hermits and
open to invasion and conquest, and he might, arts. Other forms of belles lettres, especially the heroes —were mostly the work of professional
however incorrectly, have seen the Chinese prose essay and prose-poem, also had venerable artists rather than cultivated literati amateurs.
people as pacific, unprepared to defend their ranking among the high arts. Literary drama And paintings done for a living rather than for
coastal regions and incapable of soldiery. Within was a late-comer (eleventh or twelfth century at self-expression came, not long after Columbus'
the century that followed, several Iberian the earliest) and held marginal status. A few time, to be viewed with disdain by the Chinese
observers would urge their rulers to invade and "minor arts," like the design and cutting of elite. In any event, the depiction of human fig-
conquer these affluent heathens who did not seals, rather peculiar to East Asian civilizations, ures in Chinese painting was far less important
accept the superiority of European faith and also were respected adjuncts of the high arts. A than in Western painting of that time. 28
morals. But Columbus would more likely have remarkably short list compared with its Western The artistic crafts, on the other hand,
seen opportunities for profitable trade and counterpart. Most notably lacking is sculpture. included a great many kinds of things that
would have urged a Spanish foothold near The Chinese did not idealize the human form as Chinese connoisseurs valued most highly.
China from which to exploit this font of riches. such, nor did they focus on it in painting or in Antiquity itself conferred worth. Antique
Precisely such an end was accomplished by the sculpture. There was virtually no secular sculp- bronze vessels and mirrors and antique carved
Manila Galleon, connecting Spanish Mexico ture of the human form. Whether in sculpture jades were held in reverence, less as art objects
with the Spanish colony in the Philippines from or in painting, the Chinese rarely depicted the than as links to the historic origins of the civili-
the 1570$, and by the base at Macao which nude or seminude human body. The occasional zation. Also prized were rubbings of famous
China granted to the Portuguese in the 1550$. exceptions were Buddhist figures, and later early calligraphies that had been incised in
Columbus might well have anticipated such other religious figures, often depicted for votive stone; rare printed works too were esteemed,
developments. purposes; they might for iconographic reasons especially the finest of Song dynasty printings.
display a bare upper torso. Beggars' emaciated Song dynasty ceramics, which generally com-
bodies might be depicted barely concealed by bined beauty with antiquity, were collected with
Art and Chinese Civilization rags (cat. 296), but such works are few and passion. Ming scholar-officials were avid collec-
We can assume that Columbus himself, along hardly exalt the perfection of the human body. tors, and were served by dealer-experts of high
with the entire late fifteenth-century European Chinese religious art, to be sure, drew on and erudition (cat. 293).
world from which he came, would have been perpetuated something of Buddhism's Indian At the same time contemporary crafts —
quite unable to understand the high arts of backgrounds, and Indian Buddhist art was metalwares, porcelains, lacquers, and carvings in
China. Five hundred years later, however, we strongly influenced by classic Grecian models. stone, ivory, horn, bamboo, and wood —were
can confidently say the West has achieved con- In China something of that influence informs also treasured by Ming collectors. The accouter-
siderable appreciation and understanding of early wall paintings and the earlier Buddhist ments of the scholar's study enjoyed particular
non-Western art on its own terms. There are, to sculpture. But although we now regard much of cachet: brush pots, brush washers, and brush
be sure, difficulties in penetrating the cultural that output, along with later Buddhist sculpture rests, inkstones and inkstone boxes, water drop-
mode that united calligraphy, poetry, and paint- and painting, as superb art, the Chinese in the pers (for making ink), wrist rests, seals, boxes of
ing in mutually reinforcing forms of expres- main regarded it as religious paraphernalia and all sizes and shapes, vases and small decorative
sion. To see the calligraphy in the context of its temple decoration. The sculptor-craftsmen were screens for the writing table. In the informal
artistic traditions, to comprehend the richness almost all anonymous. Many more Buddhist writings of the age we find many stories of
and subtlety of the poems' allusions, to view the sculptures are found in museums outside of superb objects, of their craftsmen-makers
paintings with a cultivated connoisseur's eye — China than in China, where they have been (emerging from millennia of anonymity), and
especially in those examples where the three are granted the status of art objects only in the of the competition among collectors to acquire
united in one creative act —places very high present century. their creations.
demands on the viewer. Even modern Chinese Human portraiture in both painting and On another level, the commoner crafts added

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