Page 430 - Art In The Age Of Exploration (Great Section on Chinese Art Ming Dynasty)

assert his explicitly cosmic role as intermediary 284 Edwards has summarized the poem as a "kind of
between heaven and earth. talisman, a propitiatory offering for the birth
Having learned so much about the emperor's Wang Ao and Shen Zhou
status from the painting, it may seem ungrateful 1450-1524 and 1427-1509 of a son to one long denied this blessing, to be
to observe that it tells us little about Zhu Youtang presented to a mutual friend/' In many cultures
(1470-1505) himself. Born the third son of the ODE TO THE POMEGRANATE the pomegranate has been a symbol of fertility
Chenghua emperor (r. 1464-1487) and an aborig- AND MELON and fecundity, a symbolism reinforced here by the
ine maid in the palace, Zhu grew into a humane c. 1490 ever-replenishing nature of the melon.
and much admired monarch (r. 1487-1505) who is Ming China Shen's authorship of the painting, attested by
also notable for his devotion to one woman, his hanging scroll; ink and color on paper his two seals and by Wang's poem, which names
empress and the mother of all his children. i4 7x86( 57 /8X 33 / 8) him as the painter, is confirmed by the high
7
7
Although the court academy of painters was quite references: Edwards 1962, 75, 76, xxxn, pi. 460; quality, freshness, and spontaneity of the image.
active under this ruler, the only portrait of him by Goodrich and Fang 1976, 2:1343-1346; New Haven Branches, twigs, and vine are linear and calli-
a known artist was painted by a man who refused 1977,195, 263-264, no. 32 graphic, while the better part of the painting is
an invitation to join that body. Recommended by Detroit Institute of Arts executed in colored washes without ink outlines —
a provincial governor, Jiang You traveled to Bei- what the Chinese call the "boneless" (mo gu)
jing and successfully completed a portrait of Zhu method. The result is a wet and apparently
but then declined a permanent appointment on The calligrapher Wang Ao signed this work and burgeoning depiction of leaves and fruit, visually
the grounds that he was uncultivated and rustic. added one seal, the painter Shen Zhou appended suggesting the celebration of fertility written
The present painting, however, which adheres two seals but no signature. Of the four collector's above.
closely to established laws and protocols for seals, the two on the left are unidentified, the two Wang Ao rose from the peasantry to become a
imperial portraiture, must be the work of some on the right are those of the noted connoisseur scholar-official and eventually Grand Secretary at
court specialist in the genre. Liang Qingbiao (1620-1691). the court of the Zhengde emperor (r. 1505-1521).
Among the twenty-seven extant large-scale Wang's long poem is executed in xing-cao (part An accomplished Confucian scholar, he followed
imperial portraits of the Ming period, five are way between semicursive and cursive) style, a the conservative Han dynasty Confucian tradition
half-length bust images (four depicting the first sketchy mode which may be traced back to the rather than the more fashionable Neo-Confucian-
emperor and one his empress), and one is an Eastern Han Dynasty (A.D. 25-220). Richard ism of the thirteenth and later centuries. His
equestrian portrait of the Xuande emperor (r.
1425-1435).The remaining twenty-one portray
their subjects seated; within this group there are
considerable differences among the earlier eleven
portraits, whereas the ten beginning with Zhu
Qizhen (1427-1464) are very close in composi-
tion, detail, and even physical condition, suggest-
ing that they may not all date from the lifetime
of the person portrayed. This in fact is certain in
the case of the emperor posthumously titled Xian
Huangdi, for Zhu Youyuan (1476-1519) was ele-
vated to imperial status only posthumously and
never actually ruled.
According to an account of Beijing during
the late Ming period, written by Sun Chengze
(1593-1675):
The Spirit-Shadow Hall is to the northeast of
the imperial ancestral temple. It receives and
stores portraits of emperors of the various
dynasties. Each year, on the sixth day of the
sixth lunar month, the temple provides them
with festive coverings and they are taken to the
ancestral temple. On their return to the Spirit-
Shadow Hall they are hung to dry in the sun.

On the fall of the capital to the Manchus in 1644,
the entire group of Ming and earlier imperial por-
traits became part of the Qing imperial collection.
The paintings were stored by the new rulers from
the north in the Southern Fragrance Hall and
were recorded in palace inventories taken in 1749
and 1816. Subsequently moved to a summer
palace in Manchuria, the paintings were returned
to Beijing in 1913 and, in 1948, were transported
to Taiwan, the easternmost portion of the domain
ruled by this august Ming personage. H.R.

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