Beyond Boundaries : East and West Cross-Cultural Encounters [1 ed.] 9781443839365, 9781443832946

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Beyond Boundaries

Beyond Boundaries: East and West Cross-Cultural Encounters

Edited by

Michelle Ying Ling Huang

Beyond Boundaries: East and West Cross-Cultural Encounters, Edited by Michelle Ying Ling Huang This book first published 2011 Cambridge Scholars Publishing 12 Back Chapman Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2XX, UK British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Copyright © 2011 by Michelle Ying Ling Huang and contributors All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. ISBN (10): 1-4438-3294-4, ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-3294-6

TABLE OF CONTENTS

List of Illustrations................................................................................viii Acknowledgements................................................................................. xi Preface..................................................................................................xiii Toshio Watanabe Introduction .............................................................................................1 Michelle Ying Ling Huang Part I: Early Examples of East & West Endeavours Chapter One........................................................................................... 16 The Beginnings of the East-West Dialogue: An Examination of Dionysiac Representations in Gandharan and Kushan-Mathuran Art SeungJung Kim Chapter Two .......................................................................................... 36 Early Global Encounters as Motor of Visual Language Change: The Case of Medieval France Anja Eisenbeiß Chapter Three ........................................................................................ 53 Ottoman Miniatures and Hungarian Woodcuts: A Strata of Representations in Common AnnMarie Perl Part II: Anglo-Japanese Cultural Exchanges in Museum Practice and Art Making Chapter Four.......................................................................................... 76 The Art of Copying: Reproductions of Japanese Masterpieces in the British Museum Princess Akiko of Mikasa

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Table of Contents

Chapter Five .......................................................................................... 88 The Influence of Japanese Expertise on the British Reception of Chinese Painting Michelle Ying Ling Huang Chapter Six.......................................................................................... 112 A Legacy of Matsubayashi Tsurunosuke in St Ives: Introduction of the Art of Japanese Ceramic Making to the British Studio Pottery Shinya Maezaki Part III: Fabricating the Other Chapter Seven...................................................................................... 124 Intended to Deceive: Illusionistic Painting at the EighteenthCentury Chinese Court Kristina Kleutghen Chapter Eight....................................................................................... 138 The Collecting of Famille Noire Porcelain in the West: The Problem with Authenticity of Large Scale Famille Noire Vases Konstanze Amelie Knittler Chapter Nine........................................................................................ 152 Western Expectations and the Question of Self-Exoticism in the Works of Contemporary Iranian Photographers Samine Tabatabaei Chapter Ten ......................................................................................... 170 Nihilist Nationalist or Syncretic Hybridist: A Visual Analysis of the Representations of Mishima Yukio in the 1985 Edition of Barakei Yayoi Shionoiri Part IV: Cross-Cultural Encounters in Contemporary Visual Culture Chapter Eleven..................................................................................... 192 Understanding the Art of Contemporary Calligraphy in China Sarah Sau Wah Ng

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Chapter Twelve.................................................................................... 213 Transnational Otaku Culture: A Comparative Study of Anime Fans in the U.S. and in Taiwan Pei-Ti Wang Chapter Thirteen .................................................................................. 230 Marketing the Other: Exoticism in the Promotion of Literature from the Middle East and Asia Duygu Tekgül Contributors......................................................................................... 249 Index ................................................................................................... 253

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

1-1 Railing Pillar. India, Mathura, Kushan period (first century-320 AD), 100s. Red sandstone. Height: 80cm. The Cleveland Museum of Art. John L. Severance Fund 1977.34. 1-2 Exterior view of an Athenian red-figure drinking cup by Makron, mid-fifth century BC. Berlin Staatliche Museen 2290. Illustration drawn by the author. 1-3 Female figure on a Roman Dionysiac Sarcophagus, second century AD. Munich Glyptothek 365. Illustration drawn by the author from Matz 1968, pl. 98. 2-1 Cité des Dames Master, Princes of the East, Thomas of Saluzzo, Le Chevalier Errant, c. 1403-5. Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, Ms. fr. 12559, fol. 162 © Bibliothèque nationale de France. 2-2 Workshop of the Virgil Master, Musical Performance, Saint Augustine, La Cité de Dieu, c. 1410-2. Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, Ms. fr. 6272, fol. 33 © Bibliothèque nationale de France. 2-3 Pagan Idolatry and Courtly Love, Saint Augustine, La Cité de Dieu, c. 1403-5. Boulogne-sur-Mer, Bibliothèque municipale, Ms. 55 (I), fol. 37v © Bibliothèque municipale, Boulogne-sur-Mer. 3-1 Osman, Nicopolis, 1396. Miniature in Seyyid Loqman, Hünernâme (1579), Vol. 1. Topkapi Palace Museum, Istanbul, Inv. No. H. 1523-108b. 3-2 Osman, Sultan Murad sits on his Throne, having just slashed asunder János Hunyadi’s Helmet. Miniature in Seyyid Loqman, Hünernâme (1579), Vol. 1. Topkapi Palace Museum, Istanbul, Inv. No. H. 1523-143b. 3-3 János Hunyadi. Woodcut in János Thuróczy, Chronica Hungarorum (1488) (Brünn edition). Spencer Collection, The New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations. 3-4 Literal Battle Scene. Woodcut in János Thuróczy, Chronica Hungarorum (1488) (Augsburg edition). National Széchényi Library, Budapest, Rare Books Department, Inc. 1143. 3-5 Figurative Battle Scene. Woodcut in János Thuróczy, Chronica Hungarorum (1488) (Augsburg edition). National Széchényi Library, Budapest, Rare Books Department, Inc. 1143. 3-6 The Persian inscription reads: “A stone [cannon-ball] was set loose and with thunder and lightning turned the earth into a sea of blood. It hit the head of the commander’s horse, which by this blow was torn asunder.” Miniature in Fethullah Arif Çelebi (Arifi), Süleymannâme (1558). Topkapi Palace Museum, Istanbul, Inv. No. H. 1517-533a. 3-7 The Persian inscription reads: “The horse collapsed beneath the commander and bathed the earth in blood.” Miniature in unknown author, Fütühat-I Camila (1558). Topkapi Saray Museum, Istanbul, Inv. No. H. 1592-19a.

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3-8 0DWUDNoÕ 1DV€K, inscription reads: “On this side of the village of Kestöh [Kesztölc, near Bátaszék], on July 13, four miles. Opposite to it Seksar [Szekszárd], on July 14, two miles and a half. The castle of Tona [Tolna], on July 15 WZR PLOHV´ 0LQLDWXUH LQ 0DWUDNoÕ 1DV€K, Süleymannâme (1551) at the earliest. Topkapi Palace Museum, Istanbul, Inv. No. H. H.1608-87b. 3-9 Levni, Performances of the Topcu Corps, 1720. Miniature in Vehbi, Surname-I Vehbi (1729-30). Topkapi Palace Museum, Istanbul, Inv. No. A.3593-47a. 3-10 Hungarian-Style Shield (exterior view), c. 1500-50. Wood, leather, gesso, polychromy. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Rogers Fund, 1949 (49.57.1). Image © The Metropolitan Museum of Art. 4-1 Attributed to Sakurai KǀXQ, 0LURNXMǀGR]X (copy), 1870-80s. Ink and colour on paper. 310 x 248cm. The William Anderson collection, the British Museum. © The Trustees of the British Museum. 4-2 Niiro &KnjQRVXNH Kudara Kannon (copy), 1920. Carved and painted wood, gesso and bronze. © The Trustees of the British Museum. 5-1 Attributed to Lu Ji, Pheasants and Other Birds, with Plum-Tree and Ducks and Various Small Birds, with Willow and Plum-Trees, mid-Ming dynasty (c. 1488-1505). Ink and colours on silk. Hanging scroll. 193.1 x 101.3cm. The William Anderson collection, museum numbers Ch.Ptg.97 & Ch.Ptg.98. © The Trustees of the British Museum. 5-2 Claimed to be by Mi Fu but painted in the style of Wen Zheng, A Pair of Cranes, late Ming to early Qing dynasty (c. seventeenth-eighteenth century). Ink and colours on silk. Hanging scroll. 132.5 x 61.5cm. The William Anderson collection, museum numbers Ch.Ptg.47 & Ch.Ptg.48. © The Trustees of the British Museum. 5-3 After Gu Kaizhi, detail of The Admonitions of the Court Instructress, eighth century. It is now considered to be a Tang dynasty copy of the original. Ink and colours on silk. Handscroll. 24.4 x 343.8cm. Museum number Ch.Ptg.1. © The Trustees of the British Museum. 6-1 Photograph taken in St Ives in 1923. From left: Hamada 6KǀML%HUQDUG/HDFK, Armorel Nance or Katherine Pleydell-Bouverie, Matsubayashi Tsurunosuke, Muriel Leach. The collection of Asahi-yaki Shiryokan 㛅㖍䃤屯㕁棐. 7-1 Wang Youxue and other court painters, Studio of Exhaustion from Diligent Service (Juanqin zhai ῎⊌滳), 1774-9. Tongjing hua, mineral pigments on silk, various sizes. Palace Museum, Beijing. 7-2 Ilantai, Perspective Paintings East of the Lake (Hudong xianfa hua 㷾㜙䶂㱽 䔓), Plate 20 from Pictures of the European Palaces and Fountains (Xiyang lou shuifa tu 大 㲳 㦻 㯜 㱽 ⚾ ) (1781-6). Series of twenty copperplate engravings, each approximately 87 x 51cm. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London. 8-1 Famille Noire vase with straight sides, decorated with blossoming flowers and birds, nineteenth century. 48 x 14.6cm. C. 1303-1910, Salting Bequest. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

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List of Illustrations

8-2 Blue and white vase, decorated with blossoming flowers and trees, Kangxi period (1662-1722). 48 x 14.6cm. C. 991-1910, Salting Bequest. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London. 8-3 Famille Noire vase with trumpet-shaped neck, decorated with blossoming flowers, rocks, birds and trees, nineteenth century. 70.5 x 28.3cm. C. 13141910, Salting Bequest. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London. 8-4 Famille Noire vase with baluster shaped lower body, decorated with flowers, rocks, birds and trees. 37.5 x 20cm. C. 1311-1910, Salting Bequest, the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. Photograph by Konstanze A. Knittler. 9-1 Shadi Ghadirian, Qajar, 1998. Photograph. 100x 70 cm. © Courtesy of the artist. 9-2 Shadi Ghadirian, Qajar, 1998. Photograph. 100 x 70 cm. © Courtesy of the artist. 9-3 Sadegh Tirafkan, Hammurabi’s Law Code, 2001. C Print. 60 x 90cm. © Courtesy of the artist. 9-4 Sadegh Tirafkan, Iranian Men, 2000. C Print. 60 x 90cm. © Courtesy of the artist. 9-5 Sadegh Tirafkan, Iranian Men, 2000. C Print. 60 x 90cm. © Courtesy of the artist. 10-1 Hosoe Eikoh, Barakei, #19, 1962, 1962. Gelatin silver print, variable © Hosoe Eikoh. 10-2 Hosoe Eikoh, Barakei, #22, 1961, 1962. Gelatin silver print, variable © Hosoe Eikoh. 10-3 Hosoe Eikoh, Barakei, #24, 1961, 1962. Gelatin silver print, variable © Hosoe Eikoh. 11-1 Colourful calligraphy as souvenir. 11-2 Mao Zedong, Renmin ribao ˪Ṣ㮹㖍⟙˫ (People’s Daily), the name of a newspaper in Mainland China. 11-3 Gu Gan, Calligraphic work for a label of the French wine Château Mouton Rothschild, 1996. Photograph courtesy of Chong Hiu-yeung. 11-4 Street calligraphy in Beijing, China. 11-5 Xu Bing, inside page of Book from the Sky, 1988. Courtesy of the collection of Prof. Michael Sullivan, Oxford. Photograph by Sarah Ng. 11-6 Tsang Tsou-choi, calligraphy in Kwun Tong, Hong Kong. Photograph courtesy of Lo Kwan-chi. 11-7 Chui Pui Chee, Running Script of Su Shi Poem, 2010. Ink on canvas. 120 x 620 x 8cm. © Courtesy of the artist. 13-1 Web site designed for Vintage East Collection, launched in 2006 by Vintage. Used by permission of The Random House Group Ltd. 13-2 The cover of Palace of Desire by Naguib Mahfouz (Black Swan, 1998). Used by permission of The Random House Group Ltd.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This book represents one outcome of the two-day international and interdisciplinary conference held at the University of St Andrews in Scotland on 11-12 September 2009. This event represented much hard work, effort and support by a great number of people, to whom my thanks are due. The East & West Cross-Cultural Encounters conference was sponsored by the Great Britain Sasakawa Foundation; the Royal Historical Society; the Scottish Society for Art History; as well as the School of Art History and the GRADskills, University of St Andrews. Without their generous financial support, this conference would not have been possible. I owe a large debt of gratitude to Prof. Brendan Cassidy, Dr Luke Gartlan, Ms Annette Carruthers and Dr Natalie Adamson from the School of Art History at St Andrews, for their enormous support and useful advice on the planning and funding sources of the conference. I would also like to thank the excellent and efficient team of support staff, including Dawn Waddell, Margaret Hall, Lynn Ayton and Mary Woodcock-Kroble, for their help with logistical details and publicity for the event. Special thanks are due to Anna Glomm, Kate Groninger and Joseph Hammond, who were particularly helpful in co-organising the event. Prof. Toshio Watanabe, Prof. George Wheeler, Dr Anja Eisenbeiß, Mr Robin Spencer, Dr Jeremy Howard and Dr Linda Goddard, who took their important roles as panel chair and discussant, contributed to create a stimulating and congenial atmosphere in which to pull together the inspiring ideas of each paper presented in the conference. I am particularly grateful to the support of Prof. Watanabe who has graciously contributed an insightful preface to this book. I would also like to express my gratitude to all the speakers who cheerfully shared their research, and especially to the contributors who conscientiously prepared their papers for this volume. I am greatly indebted to Dr Charlotte de Mille who has given me practical suggestions on developing the book proposal. I am very grateful to Carol Koulikourdi, Amanda Millar and Soucin Yip-Sou of the Cambridge Scholars Publishing for providing professional advice and assistance throughout the editing process of the manuscript. I also thank Alison Davies for her assistance in my language work. I should extend my thanks to all the artists, museum staff members and archivists for granting us permission to reproduce pictures in their collections. Finally, I would

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like to express my heartfelt gratitude to Prof. Michael Sullivan and Dr Stacey Pierson for their inspiring words of wisdom and support.

PREFACE

The study of East-West cross-cultural encounters has come a long way since my student days. The “bombshell” of Edward W. Said’s (1935-2003) Orientalism published in 1978 has not immediately reached all corners of our discipline of art history. I have to admit that I was not aware of it when I completed my Ph.D. in 1984, but then at my Ph.D.’s subsequent publication, I wished to take some position on this issue and was allowed to add only one page at the very end. Whether one likes it or not, Said’s book has changed the scene. It is true to say that socio-political investigation in art history was in itself not new at the time, but it was how Said sharpened the debate, which was so attractive to many and he presented us with an easy-to-grasp formula: Orientalism = Western domination over the East. Said himself qualifies this formula with many provisos and later moved to a more nuanced position, but nevertheless in my view this simple formula had a powerful influence over many people because of its clarity and simplicity however oversimplified it maybe. In that sense it is very similar to another famous clear and simple statement: Rudyard Kipling’s (1865-1936) “East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet”. This also is usually quoted outside its original context and became a formula. Many scholars dismiss such formulae and insist that they have no place in a serious academic debate. However, I do find such a formula useful as an ahistorical tool, as long as we are aware of what it is. For example, Yuko Kikuchi has used this formula and applied it to Japan’s attitude to its colonies as “Oriental Orientalism”, transcending its original East/West context and applying it to East/East context in her 2004 book Japanese Modernisation and Mingei Theory: Cultural Nationalism and Oriental Orientalism. Partha Mitter on the other hand turns the debate around and tells the story from the other side as “Occidental Orientations” in his 1994 book, Art and Nationalism in Colonial India 1850-1922: Occidental Orientations. Here Said’s formula is used as something not really to agree or oppose but to transcend and Mitter points out that both the Orientalists and their critics “neglect the individual response of the colonized to the historical situation in which they found themselves” (Mitter 1994, 7). These are cases where Said’s formula has been usefully utilised beyond its original context. Of course Said’s Orientalism is not the only show in town. There have

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been many fascinating and intriguing developments. Compared to my student days, we will find different methodologies, for example, examinations of not just bilateral but multilateral relationships are becoming more common. Larger regions are investigated as a unit, such as East Asia rather than just China, Japan or Korea. Gender issues are more widely examined and less powerful people or cultures are given stronger agency than before. The non-fine art genres, such as craft or photography, are entering mainstream debate. Popular culture is now been treated seriously by art historians. Too interesting a subject to leave it just to sociologists, as many of them are so visual! Not only the production of art but also its consumption and reception are often examined in detail. Not just the aesthetic merit of an artwork is analysed, but also its sociopolitical context, its protagonists and institutions. These and many more new developments are affecting the study of East-West encounters and you will find many such stimulating examples within this volume. Toshio Watanabe University of the Arts London

Works Cited Kikuchi, Yuko. 2004. Japanese Modernisation and Mingei Theory: Cultural Nationalism and Oriental Orientalism. London: RoutledgeCurzon. Mitter, Partha. 1994. Art and Nationalism in Colonial India 1850-1922: Occidental Orientations. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Said, Edward W. 1978. Orientalism. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.

INTRODUCTION MICHELLE YING LING HUANG

The interaction between the East and West has historically been illuminated in world history in relation to significant events of expedition, trade, colonialism and religious transmission. For centuries, there had been occasional contacts across countries. Since the sixteenth century, the accelerated flow of people, commodities, currency and ideas from one nation to the other had contributed to the active dialogue between Asian and Western cultures. In 2004, the exhibition of Encounters: The Meetings of Asia and Europe, 1500-1800 held at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London presented a wide range of historical evidence, both written and visual, which demonstrated the confrontation between Asian and Western countries in the early modern period. The accompanying catalogue investigates how, in the European mind, the West discovered Asia, and explores the human dimension of the story by looking at the face-to-face meeting of Asians and Europeans through diplomatic, religious, economic and personal encounters. This exhibition also examines the material dimension of the East-West relationship, especially the mechanism that developed in Asia for producing Western-style artworks for export (Jackson and Jaffer 2004). Going beyond the geographical and cultural boundaries of one’s homeland, the comparative study of Western and Asian art has helped to broaden our horizon and deepened our understanding of the race, identity, culture, thought and religion of different countries. The experience and early written accounts of explorers, travellers, diplomats, merchants and artists fired the European imagination about the wondrous civilisations of Asia, yet the development of transnational relations in trade and political affairs is historically a contested process, which manifests in the unbalanced power relations between Eastern and Western countries. Anna Jackson and Amin Jaffer discern that the goods exchanged between East and West—whether tea and cotton or maps and guns—brought about real social, economic and political changes; but the exotic could also be something that was simply enjoyable, wondrous, fashionable or amusing that lent lustre and interest to the domestic scene without beating a threat. However, by appropriating the exotic, by extracting

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Introduction and consuming certain elements of it, one could claim emblematic power over the other … Occidentalism or Orientalism could be employed to challenge authority, and could represent a counter-culture by which it was possible to question one’s own accepted norms (Ibid., 9).

Although the European attitude towards Asia was invariably coloured by their perceived position of superiority and by their preconceived assumptions about the inferior East, in some periods Westerners did not succumb to their feelings of cultural prejudice but showed marked appreciation of Asian religions, thoughts, arts and cultures. Likewise, Asians also expressed their admiration towards Western science, technology and painting techniques. The reception, possession and consumption of imported objects, resulting from either foreign trade, political affairs, religious transmission or archaeological excavations, not only shaped one’s understanding and conception of the Cultural Other, but also offered each other an opportunity to embrace alternative modes of being and behaviours and to transcend the boundaries of naive and foreign, of reality and fantasy. In The Meeting of Eastern and Western Art (1973; rev. ed. 1989), Michael Sullivan articulates the intertwined relationships and artistic influences between the arts of China, Japan and Western Europe. He sees “the meeting of East and West not as a conflict, or even as a reconciliation, of opposites, but as a dynamic and truly life-enhancing dialectic” (Sullivan 1989, xix). He regards “the interaction between East and West as a process in which the great civilisations, while preserving their own character, will stimulate and enrich each other” (Ibid., 282). The mind and choice of the artist plays an important role in the processes of ingestion, acceptance and transformation of foreign techniques and styles, while confronting new objects and ideas. Being a creative individual, the artist may adapt, appropriate, translate or distort the imported stimuli in order to transform them into different modes of artistic expression. The hybrid form of art was not only achieved by artists, but also by other art practitioners such as collectors, curators and scholars who disseminated knowledge of global art and culture through collections, exhibitions, lectures and publications. Thus, extensive research into visual arts, culture and society is much needed to enlighten the development and effects of East-West cultural encounters from wider perspectives. The nature of East-West cultural interaction is changing, as artefacts, artworks, cultural products, ideas and people move rapidly across the world in the present era of globalisation. During the last two decades or so, the theoretical discourses of hybridity, multiculturalism and globalisation have become topical in conferences, journals and books in the fields of arts, business and science. A number of interesting and carefully researched

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publications on globalisation, global art, intercultural aesthetics and cultural encounters have come out of the interdisciplinary endeavours of departments such as political science, sociology, philosophy, anthropology and art history. 1 Contemporary scholars employ different theoretical approaches to study the ways in which the increasing worldwide cross-fertilisation and interpenetration of different cultures change the social structures, class relations, socio-cultural identities and behaviours, the meaning of the cultural heritage, and aesthetic experiences. Without limiting their analysis to the mainstream of Western thought and aesthetics, international scholars introduced new research methods and perspectives that enable people to construct a global image of the world. On the other hand, attention to the East-West cultural interaction is evident in recent museum projects, exhibitions and academic activities among international institutions. For instance, the extension of Asian galleries at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford (2005-9), the British Museum in London (2007-9) and the National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh (2007-11) shows the growing interest in Asian art and culture within the United Kingdom. The British Museum’s exhibition of Britain meets the World 1714-1830 held at the Palace Museum, Beijing (2007), the Musée Guimet’s exhibition of Paris 1730-1930: A Taste for China at the Hong Kong Museum of Art (2008), and the exhibition of Chinoiserie: Asia and Europe, 1620-1840 at the National Gallery of Victoria in Australia (2009-10), present the legacy of intercultural encounters and demonstrate the increasing collaboration between museums in different countries. 2 International conferences further open up critical perspectives in which political, social, cultural, human and material dimensions of cross-cultural encounters are taken into account. Such events include the Collecting East & West conference co-organised by the Florence University of the Arts and the British Institute of Florence (June 2009), the CIHA conference Crossing Cultures: Conflict, Migration and Convergence at the University of Melbourne (January 2008), and the international workshop China Trade 1760-1860: Merchants and Artists—New Historical and Cultural Perspectives at the Macau Ricci Institute (March 2011), to name a few. Driven by the important discourse of globalisation and my research interest in cross-cultural studies, I started to organise an international conference East & West Cross-Cultural Encounters at the School of Art 







1 For collected volumes on globalisation and cross-cultural studies in art, see, for examples, Hallam and Street 2000; Birchwood and Dimmock 2005; Schirm 2007; Feagin 2007; Braembussche, Kimmerle and Note 2009; Anderson 2009. 2 For exhibition catalogues, see The British Museum 2007; The Hong Kong Museum of Art 2008; Cains and Martin 2009.

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History, University of St Andrews in 2009. The event assembled a diverse group of international scholars from Asia, Australia, Europe and the United States to re-think, explore and evaluate East-West confrontation in visual arts and culture from the global, comparative and interdisciplinary perspectives. Chapters in Beyond Boundaries: East & West Cross-Cultural Encounters mainly derive from the 2009 conference at St Andrews, but also include additional papers investigating East-West cultural exchanges and interactions, spanning several countries, centuries and disciplines. This book encompasses the cutting edge research of the people involved, and advocates a multiplicity of ethnicities, specialties, as well as artistic and socio-cultural perspectives. The subjects range from archaeology, art history and photography, to conservation, sociology and cultural studies, with cross-disciplinary examples of classical, modern and contemporary periods. This volume seeks to inspire new ideas and stimulate further scholarly debate on the convergence, dissimilarities and mutual influences of the visual arts and material culture of Asia, the Middle East, Europe and the United States. The chapters are grouped chronologically and thematically into four parts:

Early Examples of East and West Endeavours This volume begins with early examples of the East-West cultural clash as exemplified in selected sculptures, miniatures and woodcuts from the ancient times to the sixteenth century. SeungJung Kim’s opening chapter traces the “beginning” of cross-cultural dialogues between the East and West over 2,000 years ago. The millennium following the conquest of Alexander of Macedon (356-323 BC) in the northern borders of India in 330 BC saw a flowering of mixed cultural synthesis in the western Asiatic lands, known as the Greater Gandhara (now Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Northern India). She examines the variegated visual heritage of Alexandria on the Caucasus (now Begram in Afghanistan) which attests to early commercial exchanges between China, South-Central Asia and the Greco-Roman world. Remarkable archaeological finds, such as Buddha coins with bilingual Greek and Kharosthi inscriptions, Indic style Athenas and Herakles, Indic ivory figurines, as well as “Apollo-Buddha” statues of the Kushan period (first century-320 AD), bespeak the complex amalgamation of cultures, traditions and conventions in the multi-ethnic and multi-lingual societies of Greater Gandhara. Kim urges for newer assessments and understanding of the complex cultural interactions that engendered the phenomenon of Gandhara. Her in-depth analysis of “dionysiac” representations in Kushan Buddhist art

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reveals the confluence of Greco-Roman Classicism (or “Gandharan Classicism”) and Indian Buddhism. Through a comparative study of Greek and Roman material as well as the cult of Dionysos, Kim explains how an unmistakably Greco-Roman subject matter was used and adapted to an Indic religious context. She poses some thought-provoking questions of the “dionysiac” representations in the visual tradition of the Classical West, Gandhara and Kushan-Mathura. Selected examples, including the carved relief railing pillar from Kushan Mathura in the Cleveland Museum of Art, Makron’s Classical Greek vase of the mid-fifth century BC, a second-century Roman dionysiac sarcophagus in Munich Glyptothek, and other Gandharan sculptures, are analysed in order to reveal their visual echo of dionysiac characteristics and their distinctive iconographic device. The detailed analysis of style and iconography, especially the decorative manner and dionysiac semantics, not only shows Kim’s close observation of local and foreign elements in the aforementioned artworks and artefacts, but also her careful consideration of the cultures, religions, iconographic traditions and artistic innovations of the Classical Greek, Kushan Mathura and other regions. Concerning the influence of Roman iconographic tradition on Gandharan Buddhist relief sculptures, Kim further investigates the cultic significance of Dionysos known in the Classical world and how it might bear on our Western Asiatic context. She enlightens the symbolic link between cultic and eschatological symbolisms of dionysiac representation in Roman sarcophagi and certain aspects of Buddhist thought and practice. Anja Eisenbeiß defines the age of globalisation as a dynamic process rather than a static condition. She questions how working with a concept of cultural entanglements reaching beyond traditional, fixed borders might and in some ways already has changed our understanding of medieval art. Like Kim, Eisenbeiß also considers the religious dimension of art as well as the issues of iconographic appropriation and adaptation across cultures. She explores the history of “Global Middle Ages”, focusing on the cultural entanglements in Paris in the years around 1400. Political encounters between the Ottoman Turks, the French, the Hungarians and others fostered Parisian workshops’ knowledge of Eastern people and garments. Boosted by Ottoman military supremacy and intensive trade relations, art objects and ideas brought from the Ottoman surroundings to France and a fascination with Eastern culture gave rise to the concept of “Eastern-ness” in the artistic production of early fifteenth-century French miniatures. Eisenbeiß investigates to what extent the preoccupation with Eastern motifs changes the visual language of French illuminators in the years around 1400 and the early fifteenth century. She argues that some Parisian workshops added a touch of Eastern-ness to the scene in Saint Augustine’s

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Introduction

City of God illuminated manuscript, yet the addition of Oriental clothing, textiles and objects were used to mark religious Otherness and formed part of the iconographical patterns. While Orientalised features could be added to pictures without any thorough knowledge of Eastern culture, this practice became a visual strategy to highlight the intended “reading” of the Orientalised picture. Thus, intensified preoccupations and exchanges with the East in the years around 1400 had stimulated new visual strategies and enriched the late medieval French image world with the idea of the Cultural Other. While Eisenbeiß regards political events, such as the Battle of Nicopolis in 1396, as one factor to enhance Western knowledge of Oriental people and costumes, AnnMarie Perl also considers the political dimension of East-West dialogues by looking at the imbalance power relation between the dominant Ottoman Empire and the vastly subdominant Hungary. Her paper sketches the closest possible correspondence of Ottoman and Hungarian contemporary histories, beyond national and cultural boundaries, being the existence of a strata of artistic representations in common. The histories of common military conflicts illustrated on the page in Ottoman miniatures and Hungarian woodcuts and re-enacted in public mock battles in Istanbul and Hungary are remarkably similar. They render superficial yet insufficient stereotypical perspectives of Ottomans viewing the West as decadent and Hungarians viewing the Ottomans as barbarous. Perl examines the expectation of patronage, miniaturists’ practice and perspective of artistic production, as well as the diverse ethnicity of artists in the Islamic and Ottoman worlds. Ottoman and Hungarian artists worked in each others’ home countries and modes, moving in the main from the periphery to the centre of the Ottoman Empire. This kind of cross-cultural transfer helps historically account for the homogeneous Ottoman artistic style and the “original” Ottoman genre of historiography, which emerge out of the diversity of the Ottoman Empire in the sixteenth century. More than an original invention, Perl argues that these are products of a cosmopolitan attitude and reality.

Anglo-Japanese Cultural Exchanges in Museum Practice and Art Making From the Gandharan and Kushan-Mathuran Buddhist sculptures to the early modern miniatures and woodcuts of battle scenes, a hybrid form of art was produced through early cross-cultural encounters in war and trade. Art objects moved between places not only signify local, regional, national or

Beyond Boundaries: East and West Cross-Cultural Encounters

7

foreign traits and ideas, but also serve as an agent with the power to transform societies and the practice of artistic production. In the late nineteenth century, the growing appreciation and enhanced knowledge of Asian art and culture centred on the collecting activity and conservation projects of artworks and artefacts by museums and collectors. Intense cultural exchanges between Japan and Britain led to the transmission of Japanese knowledge, ideas and objects which not only facilitated the British understanding of Japanese art but also influenced the conception and interpretation of Chinese art. Princess Akiko of Mikasa articulates the close cultural interaction between Britain and Japan through a discussion of the reproductions of Japanese works in the collection of the British Museum and the activities of Japanese art specialists of the two nations. Copying classical works or masterpieces was a fundamental element of art training and a solution to preserve early original works in both Eastern and Western traditions. While the collecting of reproductions reached its peak of popularity in Europe during the second half of the nineteenth century, plaster casts of Classical and Renaissance sculptures as well as reproductions of prints and drawings acquired by British museums were useful visual references for students to learn about the methods and styles of masterpieces. Princess Akiko emphasises that the Westerner’s interest in acquiring reproductions and the Japanese aim of producing reproductions came together simultaneously during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. At the time the copying projects of Japanese art and ancient relics were commissioned by both the Japanese government as well as British collectors and curators who resided in Japan for diplomatic missions, travels and cultural exchanges. The value of the art of copying and the function of reproductions of paintings and sculptures made for preservation and educational purposes are recognised. Drawing on the fine reproductions of the Kudara Kannon and the wall painting of the Golden Hall of Hǀrynj-ji temple ऄၼ‫ ڝ‬in the collections of the British Museum and the Tokyo National Museum, Princess Akiko argues that these replicas played a crucial role in introducing authentic Japanese art to the West, yet this role has been overlooked in current scholarship because they are not “originals”. Michelle Huang also concerns herself with the cultural exchange between Japan and Britain and their impact on the British reception of Chinese painting at the turn of the twentieth century. Like Princess Akiko, Huang’s research relates to the collecting and study of East Asian art in late Victorian and early Edwardian Britain, especially the collectors, curators and scholars who contributed to the formation of the British Museum’s collections of Japanese and Chinese paintings. With reference to museum

8

Introduction

records, manuscripts and early literatures, Huang investigates why and how Japanese expertise played an important role in shaping the British conception of Chinese pictorial art. As revealed in the experience of Laurence Binyon (1869-1943) and his circles of friends and colleagues at the British Museum, traditional Chinese painting was invariably viewed through Japanese and European spectacles. Such a tendency was reflected in the early acquisitions, publications, as well as curatorial and conservation projects of Oriental painting in the early twentieth century. To complement Princess Akiko’s discussion of the reproductions of Japanese Buddhist art, Huang further examines the educational value of reproductions of Japanese and Chinese art in The Kokka πഏဎρmagazine and the British Museum’s continued support for Japanese scholars to carry out copying projects for an early Chinese handscroll, Admonitions of the Court Instructress πՖ‫׾‬ᒥቹρ. Early collectors’ unreliable aesthetic judgement and inaccurate classification of artworks imply that there is not only an urgent need to revise the attribution of Japanese and Chinese paintings acquired in early periods, but also raise doubts of the paintings’ actual historical value and aesthetic quality. Apart from the question of authenticity, Huang discerns that the writings on Oriental art by Japanese and European scholars were major references for the study of Chinese painting and aesthetics in Britain. Nevertheless, the ethnicity, educational background, taste and perspective of the writer would have influenced his or her interpretation of the close relationship and distinctive characters of Japanese and Chinese painting. Okakura Kakuzo’s ࡽପ㽱Կ (1862-1913) The Ideals of the East (1903) was an early reference shaping Binyon’s understanding of Chinese painting and thought from the perspective of a Japanese nationalist. While the Japanese expertise and technique were handed down to the British Museum’s curators, restorers and mounters, the knowledge of Japanese ceramic making was also transmitted to British potters in the first half of the twentieth century. Based on a recent discovery of Matsubayashi Tsurunosuke’s ࣪ࣥ呢հ‫ܗ‬㻃 (1894-1932) family archive, Shinya Maezaki introduces the background of the Japanese ceramicist and discusses how the Japanese expertise in ceramic making was handed down to British potters. During his short stay in St Ives, Cornwall in 1923-4, Matsubayashi lectured on the theory and manufacture of ceramics and provided practical training in ceramic making. He built a Japanese-style three-chambered climbing kiln for Bernard Howell Leach (1887-1979) and maintained a sustainable production system necessary for the survival of the Leach Pottery in its infancy. The legacy that Matsubayashi left for the Pottery was fostered by Leach and over 100 graduates, and further passed to other students both across and beyond Britain. Their creative works and activities worldwide

Beyond Boundaries: East and West Cross-Cultural Encounters

9

prove global dissemination of the art of Japanese ceramic making.

Fabricating the Other While the Japanese artists, scholars and mounters helped to foster the British knowledge of Oriental painting and the making of reproductions and ceramics, European techniques and perspectives also challenged the convention of representations in Asian painting, ceramics, and photography. During the eighteenth century, tongjing hua ຏ ན ྽ ʳ or “penetrable-scene paintings” were jointly created by a group of European and Chinese artists, serving the Qianlong ೓ၼ Emperor (r. 1736-1795) in the 1770s. The massive, colourful works pasted on walls and ceilings borrowed imported European perspectival techniques to reshape the viewer’s perception of space and reality, by integrating the nearby architecture and eliminating the supporting surface. Although these Sino-European paintings were a dramatic departure from traditional ink landscapes and abstracted brushwork, they once wallpapered the Forbidden City and other imperial residences around Beijing. They also offer new insights into the roles of European art, the Italian Jesuit lay brothers and professional painters at the Chinese court during the imperial Golden Age. Based on original research conducted at the Forbidden City, Kristina Kleutghen recounts the biography of these deceptive illusionistic paintings in order to reveal new implications about Sino-European artistic exchanges at the late eighteenth-century Chinese court. Apart from the art training and collaboration between Chinese and European painters, the technical and conceptual foundations of tongjing hua are discussed. Considering the motivations behind the intentional deceptions of this mysterious and sensational genre, Kleutghen argues that the realisation of the pleasurable deception perpetrated by tongjing hua was the most valuable part of the viewing experience. The feeling of marvel and wonder at discovering the true nature of tongjing hua evoked Qianlong’s aesthetic pleasure when he (re)discovered how the European perspectival techniques could recreate the effects of real human vision and invite the viewer’s interaction. The imported techniques were put to use in an assertive and self-possessed adaptation that innovated a new kind of painting exclusive to the eighteenth-century imperial patronage. While illusionistic paintings were used to deceive the viewer, modern ceramicists also intend to produce “fake” Famille Noire wares, a fashionable type of Chinese porcelain appealing to the collectors in China, Britain and America during the late nineteenth and early twentieth

10

Introduction

centuries. In her review of early literatures and documentary evidence, Konstanze Amelie Knittler discovers several misconceptions about the dating of Famille Noire. Through a stylistic analysis of large scale Famille Noire vases in the George Salting collection at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London and the Lady Lever Art Gallery in Port Sunlight near Liverpool, she finds that those objects with a black ground were not original works produced in the late Ming (1368-1644 AD) or Kangxi ൈዺ (r. 1662-1722) periods, but were an “new” invention of the nineteenth century. The recent conservation project of Famille Noire provides additional scientific evidence for judging a more accurate dating of this type of ware produced in different periods. Knittler questions why one would have intended to produce “fake” Famille Noire wares in the late nineteenth century. To cater for the taste of imperial and private collectors in China and the West, original Kangxi porcelains were re-decorated and Famille Noire in the style of “aesthetic” blue and white Kangxi pieces were manufactured at the time. Knittler further examines the price development of Famille Noire in the British and American art markets between 1870 and 1920. Her analysis shows that American buyers’ stronger purchasing power and demand for Famille Noire were related to Western art dealers’ marketing strategy as well as the taste and wealth of collectors. Even in the late twentieth century, collectors and dealers played a dominant role in manipulating the art market and artistic practice. Samine Tabatabaei throws a specific light on the presence of Iranian art in the international art market that is mediated by Western expectations of the Orient. While examining the development of contemporary Iranian photography from the 1990s to the present, Tabatabaei finds that Iranian artists tend to reproduce a recognisable Orientalist image conforming to the Western stereotypical perception of the Orient and Middle Eastern art. While Iranian artists are frustrated and marginalised by local cultural authorities and restricted policies, many of them choose to exhibit their works in the West in order to gain recognition in the international art world. At the same time, contemporary Iranian artists challenge socio-cultural issues through new themes and media, and have become critical in evaluating the Iranian tradition and culture after the Iran-Iraq War (1980-8). Addressing the issue of exoticism and the representation of Iranian national identity, Tabatabaei regards photography as a medium for fabricating the image of the Cultural Other. She explores the development of national art in Iran and the constraints of contemporary Iranian artists in relation to the dynamic socio-political environments between the 1950s and the 1980s. In the works of two prominent Tehran-based photographers,

Beyond Boundaries: East and West Cross-Cultural Encounters

11

Tabatabaei realises that contemporary Iranian photographers play with visual features of national identity and make use of ornamental motifs and symbols of the Iranian past. They fabricate the stereotypical image of the Middle East and Oriental women that is familiar with the predominant Western perception of the Orient and Oriental women in the harem. Thus, Western superiority and the ideology of colonialism are maintained. The practice of cultural appropriation and the capacity for absorption and indigenisation of foreign cultures are also revealed in contemporary Japanese photography. Yayoi Shionoiri explores the visual testimony and representations of Mishima Yukio’s Կ୾‫ط‬ધ֛ (1925-1970) identity in the 1985 edition of Barakei ό᜷᜺٩ύ, uncovering the possible goals and reception of the collaboration between this world-renowned Japanese writer and the avant-garde Japanese photographer Hosoe Eikoh า‫ۂ‬૎ֆ (b. 1933). Through the use of bodies, fiction-staging and stage-managing techniques, Hosoe juxtaposed images of Mishima’s naked muscular body against blurry images of identifiable Italian Renaissance paintings, resulting in a mythical visual presentation of portraiture and theatrical photographic performance, and creating an important testimony to Mishima’s complex persona and his representations of multi-faceted identity along the modes of both nationalism and syncretism. Hosoe undertook a process of abstraction in capturing the body, ideologies and spirit of Mishima, who performed as object-as-subject, alongside other tangible items indicative of his aesthetic sensibilities. Shionoiri argues that Mishima’s insertion into appropriated images from the Western aesthetic canon is both an act of acceptance and an embrace of the represented ideologies. Hosoe merged Mishima’s perceived aesthetic and cultural values with the Western thought represented by artistic icons, and thus, ironically, created another Mishima myth.

Cross-Cultural Encounters in Contemporary Visual Culture In response to the influence of the Western aesthetic canon on the development of modern Asian art, how did contemporary Chinese artists make reference from European and American art in transforming their individual expression? Sarah Ng examines the transitions and negotiation of tradition between the East and West as expressed in contemporary Chinese calligraphy. Since the second century of the Eastern Han dynasty (25-220 AD), Chinese calligraphy has already been regarded as an artistic expression with a great influence on other art forms like painting. Ng discusses some key concepts that define and evaluate whether a piece of artwork is Chinese

12

Introduction

calligraphy, with special reference to contemporary views and practices under the influence of a Western perspective. On the one hand, changes in the political system and environment in modern China triggered a transformation in the nature of Chinese calligraphy. On the other hand, the cultural, informational exchanges between Eastern and Western countries in the early 1980s inspired contemporary Chinese artists to create a new form of Chinese calligraphy, which no longer possesses traditional features alone but also includes Western artistic elements. Such a transformation, either intentional or natural, successfully integrated Western ideas into Chinese calligraphy. Ng argues that Xu Bing’s (b. 1955) pseudo-language calligraphic work pushes the boundaries of Chinese art, as he transforms both conventional and contemporary Western vocabulary into calligraphy. In particular, Xu Bing uses texts from non-traditional sources, including slang, to challenge both the tradition and semantic functions of calligraphy, but at the same time, his work maintains the historical and cultural contexts of Chinese calligraphy. Ng’s paper provides new insights into the meaning and perception of contemporary Chinese calligraphy with explanations of its underlying cultural convergence. Extending the East-West artistic interaction from art history to the socio-cultural sphere, the question of how Eastern and Western cultures influence and misinterpret each other, in social behaviours, entertainments and marketing strategies, is also examined in this book. Based on ethnographic observations and face-to-face interviews conducted in New York City and Taipei, Pei-Ti Wang investigates the consumption patterns of otaku—the transnational fans of anime (Japanese animation), manga (Japanese comic books or graphic novels) and Japanese video games—in different countries. Anime, manga and games which are originated from Japanese popular culture have circulated globally, yet they have been consumed and reproduced differently by otaku across geographical and ethnical boundaries. Considering the geographic and cultural proximity and language barriers, Wang compares the otaku activities, including cosplaying, making doujinshi and fansubbing, in New York City and Taipei. In response to the development of digital technologies, as well as the conceptual framework of “affective/free labour” and “database consumption” established by contemporary cultural critics, Wang argues that transnational otaku consumption illustrates a change in capitalist consumer-producer identities, blurring boundaries between them. She relates the concept of moe—a kind of affective response towards certain character traits in anime, manga and games; or in Wang’s definition, the becoming-conscious expression of affect—to the bodies and affects in the otaku culture, in order

Beyond Boundaries: East and West Cross-Cultural Encounters

13

to uncover the changing relationship and interaction between bodies, affects and technologies. While otaku in the United States and Taiwan take advantage of digital technologies to remix and reproduce cultural products from the Japanese anime industry, publishers in the West also adopt the strategy of cross-cultural appropriation in promoting literatures from the Middle East and Asia. Duygu Tekgül explores Western encounters with the cultures of the Middle East and Asia in the British book trade, focusing on the visual elements of covers designed for translated novels. She gives an outline of marketing practices in the British book industry today and discusses exoticising strategies adopted by publishers. Through a semiological analysis of several front covers of novels translated from Chinese, Japanese, Bengali, Arabic and Turkish, Tekgül discovers that book publishers, in their packaging strategies, show a tendency to exoticise books translated from the languages of the Middle East, as well as East and South Asia. Like Tabatabaei, Tekgül also refers to postcolonial theory, such as Homi Bhabha’s discussion of Otherness and Edward Said’s theory of Orientalism, in investigating the Western conception of the East and the mode of representation of Otherness in cultural products like book covers. Tekgül further draws on literary theory, mainly Pascale Casanova’s theory on international literary space and Itamar Even-Zohar’s polysystem theory, and demonstrates that the use of exoticism in marketing translated fiction through iconic imagery seems to indicate Orientalist representations. Nevertheless, emphasising the element of “foreignness” in book promotion might contribute to the stereotypical representation of Eastern cultures in the social imagination of the West. The representation of foreign literature as exotica not only leads to a preconditioned reading of the exotic Other, but might also create and reinforce a preconception that translated fiction should be read not for its literary quality, but for its exotic nature. The collaborative effort of this collection is one step in the process of enriching knowledge and experience of cross-cultural encounters in our increasingly globalised world. By developing distinctive approaches to the cross-cultural dynamics, authors explore the cross-border interconnectedness of the world in many different contexts, and provide layered accounts of the East-West interaction in art and visual culture with complex arguments. They provide a detailed historical investigation and critical assessments of aesthetic adjustments, artistic and curatorial practices, as well as socio-political and cultural phenomena across time. They also reflect on the theoretical discourses of Orientalism, post-colonialism and globalisation. I hope that the reader will enjoy the scope, variety and profundity of the different contributions to the four parts of this book, and continue further

14

Introduction

debate on the subject with new voices.

Works Cited Anderson, Jaynie. 2009. Crossing Cultures: Conflict, Migration and Convergence: The Proceedings of the 32nd International Congress of the History of Art. Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Publishing. Birchwood, Matthew, and Matthew Dimmock. 2005. Cultural Encounters between East and West, 1453-1699. Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing. The British Museum. 2007. Britain meets the World, 1714-1830 ૎ഏፖ‫׈‬ ੺, ԫԮԫ؄ — ԫԶԿϤ‫ڣ‬. Beijing: Zijincheng chuban she. Cains, Carol, and Matthew Martin. 2009. Chinoiserie: Asia in Europe 1620-1840. Melbourne: National Gallery of Victoria. Feagin, Susan L. 2007. Global Theories of the Arts and Aesthetics. Malden, MA: Blackwell Synergy. Hallam, Elizabeth, and Brian V. Street. 2000. Cultural Encounters: Representing “Otherness”. London: Routledge. The Hong Kong Museum of Art. 2008. Paris, 1730-1930: A Taste for China ဎ७֣ᕟ, 1730-1930: խഏጲళ垸ऄഏ঴࠺. Hong Kong: Leisure and Cultural Services Department. Jackson, Anna, and Amin Jaffer. 2004. Encounters: The Meetings of Asia and Europe, 1500-1800. London: V&A Publications. Schirm, Stefan A. 2007. Globalization: State of the Art and Perspectives. London: Routledge. Sullivan, Michael. 1989. The Meeting of Eastern and Western Art, rev. and exp. ed. Berkeley: University of California Press. Van den Braembussche, Antoon, Heinz Kimmerle and Nicole Note. 2009. Intercultural Aesthetics: A Worldview Perspective. Dordrecht; London: Springer.

PART I EARLY EXAMPLES OF EAST AND WEST ENDEAVOURS

CHAPTER ONE THE BEGINNINGS OF THE EAST-WEST DIALOGUE: AN EXAMINATION OF DIONYSIAC REPRESENTATIONS IN GANDHARAN AND KUSHAN-MATHURAN ART 1 

SEUNGJUNG KIM

In 330 BC, Alexander of Macedon (356-323 BC), popularly known as Alexander the Great, defeated the last of the Achaemenid kings, Darius III (380-330 BC), and thereafter set out to conquer the previous landholdings of the vast Persian Empire. Alexander swept through present day Iran, reached the Hindu Kush, and expanded his Hellenistic Kingdom to the northern borders of India, establishing multiple colonies, or “Alexandrias”, along the way. One such city, Alexandria on the Caucasus, identified with modern day Begram in Afghanistan, has yielded one of the richest ensembles of treasures in Central Asia, attesting to intense commercial exchange on the crossroads of Eurasia. 2 A series of excavations, spanning ten years from 1936 to 1946, led to the remarkable discovery of the so-called “Begram hoard”, famous for the variety of Indic style ivories. 3 Hellenistic and Roman imports were also found within the same archaeological context: bronze figurines of an unmistakably Classical character, painted glassware from Roman Egypt, as well as Hellenistic plaster cast medallions (emblemata) that may be related to the circulation of motifs and copies. Chinese lacquer ware features in this hoard as well, among other treasures, placing the remains of the ancient city in the context 







1 I owe Prof. Vidya Dehejia for her generous guidance and Dr Christian Luczanits for his insights, and I thank Dr Michelle Huang for her editorial work and amazing patience. 2 Some scholars follow A. Foucher’s initial identification of the site as ancient Kapisi, the summer capital of the Kushans. 3 First systematic excavation done at the site dates to 1936 under the direction of J. Carl and J. Meunié, and the French Archaeological Delegation in Afghanistan.

The Beginnings of the East-West Dialogue

17

of the trade routes between China, South-Central Asia, and the Greco-Roman world, in the centuries following Alexander. Although Alexander’s presence in these eastern-most areas of conquest was rather short-lived, his legacy was certainly not, as it marked an historical point of departure in cross-cultural encounters between the East and West that continues to this day. The burgeoning contemporary interest in such early exchanges most recently culminated in the travelling exhibition titled Afghanistan: Hidden Treasures from the National Museum, Kabul, which recently concluded its itinerary at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York in 2009 (Hiebert and Cambon 2008).4 This paper sets out to examine a particular visual case study that may exemplify something of a concrete “beginning” of cross-cultural dialogues between the East and West, more than 2,000 years ago. Through the lens of a particular iconography and style that we label dionysiac, we shall examine the curious confluence of Greco-Roman Classicism and Indian Buddhism: the former as constituting the foundation of Western civilisation, and the latter, which developed into a ubiquitous current in all aspects of Eastern culture and thought.

The Syncretic Context The millennium following the conquest of Alexander indeed saw a flowering of mixed cultural synthesis in these western Asiatic lands known as the Greater Gandhara. 5 The region in question, coinciding roughly with eastern Afghanistan, Pakistan and northwest India along the Indus River, witnessed one of the most diverse cultural, ethnical and political histories during this time. This is certainly not the place to elaborate the mottled history of the region. 6 Simply consider, however, that the Seleucids, Greco-Bactrians, Indo-Greeks, Scythians, Parthians, and finally a powerful Central Asian nomadic tribe, Yuezhi ִ֭ as the Chinese called them, or the Kushans as their dynasty was eventually named, all had their turn in 



4





Note also the exhibition at the Asia Society in New York City, The Buddhist Heritage of Pakistan: Art of Gandhara (9 August - 30 October 2011), which finally opened after much political controversy. 5 For confusions in the terminology regarding geographical areas, see Brancaccio and Behrendt 2006, 1-2; for definition of the term “Greater Gandhara” see Salomon 1999, 3; for a geographical and historical overview of Greater Gandhara, see Behrendt 2004, 12-25. 6 For a brief overview of the history, see Zwalf 1996, 11-7; Errington and Cribb 1992, 1-10.

18

Chapter One

presiding over the region within the few centuries following Alexander. It is hence no accident that the region developed into an active hub in the network of trade routes collectively known as the Silk Road, eventually connecting Rome to the far stretches of the East Asian subcontinent. Naturally, we find a multi-lingual corpus of historical sources, including those written in Greek, Latin, and Chinese: records of Megasthenes, the Greek Ambassador to Candragupta’s court; the biography of Apollonius, the first century sage who went to Taxila; accounts by Chinese Buddhist monks such as Faxian ऄ᧩ (c. 337-432) and Xuanzang ‫خ‬୛ (c. 602-664), who kindly left us travel logs during their pilgrimage to Gandhara. 7 Numismatic evidence from Greater Gandhara also bespeaks multi-ethnic and multi-lingual societies. A typical bilingual Indo-Greek coin from first century BC may look no different from a Hellenistic one at first sight. Portraits of the ruler will often decorate both sides: a typical head in profile for the obverse, and perhaps an equestrian portrait for the reverse. On the obverse, a familiar legend in Greek may frame and identify the Indo-Greek king shown in his full Hellenistic charm; the reverse, however, will usually carry a translation in the local Gandharan Kharosthi script. The well-known Kanishka Boddo coins dated roughly to the second century AD show us a different kind of syncretism. 8 On the obverse, Kanishka I is usually portrayed in full-length, posing as if a proud Hellenistic ruler leaning on a sceptre. Yet the representational style of the Kushan ruler has lost all traces of Hellenism. Although Yuezhi by ethnicity, Kanishka nevertheless used Bactrian in the legend, written in a modified Greek script to allow for phonetic accuracy: ÞAONANOÞAO KANHÞKI KOÞANO (shaonanoshao kanishki koshano), which translates to “King of Kings, Kanishka the Kushan.” Moreover, the reverse, customarily a Greco-Roman deity in the West, showcases none other than the Buddha himself, identified clearly by the Greek letters: BOǻǻO. Enveloped in a double halo, the figure displays the abhaya mudra (fear-not gesture), with other identifiable characteristics such as elongated earlobes, and the usnisa atop his head, standing in an elegant hip-shot pose. Numerous finds as such from Greater Gandhara in the few centuries around Christ attest to complex amalgamation of cultures, traditions and conventions, often defying characterisation in style, form and content. Out of this melting pot emerged one of the most famous and recognisable styles 



7



Megasthenes, Indika; Philostratos, The Life and Times of Apollonius of Tyana; Faxian, A Record of Buddhistic Kingdoms; Xuanzang, Si-Yu-Ki: Buddhist Records of the Western World. 8 Göbl 1984, type 66; for dating, see Fussman 1987, 68-9, and references therein.

The Beginnings of the East-West Dialogue

19

that is termed Gandharan. 9 The so-called standing “Apollo-Buddha” statues of the Kushan period (first century-320 AD) will be familiar to most, having acquired the descriptive epithet for their apparent indebtedness to Classical sculptures of Apollo. 10 The usnisa, a cranial protuberance and one of Buddha’s thirty-two physiological traits called the laksanas, is translated here into silky waves of hair strands tied into a top knot, as in the famed Apollo Belvedere. Is the Gandharan Buddha wearing a Roman Toga? A Greek tunic and a himation? Regardless, such voluminous folds are rather unknown in the Indic visual tradition. So is the subtle modeling of the soft, undulating surfaces of the visage. The bent leg posture is often traced back to the Classical trademark of contrapposto. 11 The concept of “Gandharan Classicism”, i.e., the link between Greco-Roman Classicism and the Gandharan style, may seem rather tenuous to art historians attuned to finer distinction of styles, but unfamiliar with the visual tradition of South Asia. When considering, however, the Indic styles that preceded or followed this particular period, the Classical traits betrayed in Gandharan sculpture start to emerge so distinctly as something of an anomalous interlude in the history of South Asian art. Only then one starts to understand the obsession of classically trained European scholars of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, captivated by such “exotic familiarity”, thrilled to have discovered a form of Greek-infused art that had permeated through the far eastern corners of the Hellenistic Empire. 12 Since Alfred Foucher published the first volume of his magnum opus L’art greco-Bouddhique du Gandhara in 1905, the origins of this Gandharan style have been debated for more than a century. The term “Greco-Buddhist,” still popularly used, refers to Foucher’s thesis that the Classical style in Gandharan sculpture is a natural by-product of Hellenistic imperialism in the first couple of centuries following the conquest of Alexander. 13 At this time, artistic influence from the Hellenistic world was “exerted” onto this area, and cultural marriage between Greek rationalism and Indian religion, i.e., Buddhism, formed a new artistic tradition that lived 













9



For the complexity of styles that coexists under the rubric of the term Gandharan, see Nehru 1989. 10 For a brief history of associations between the two types of statues, see Taddei 1980. 11 See Huntington 1999, 135, Fig. 8.10 (Standing Buddha, Lahore Museum). 12 See Errington 1999, for a new assessment on Charles Masson, best known for his discovery of the Bimaran gold casket and his nineteenth-century collection from no less than fifty Buddhist stupas around Kabul; see also, Taddei 1980. 13 Foucher 1905-51, Vol. 2, 401ff; see also Foucher 1913.

20

Chapter One

on through Scytho-Parthian and later Kushan Empires. Foucher’s views as such attracted as many adherents as they provoked critiques. Included in the latter is the famous rebuttal by Ananda Coomaraswamy, claiming that the representation of the Buddha figure emerged instead as a product of indigenous Indian art traditions (Coomaraswamy 1927). Whether the first anthropomorphic form of the Buddha around the time of Christ was Gandharan or Mathuran, or rather, rephrasing it, due to the Western/Classical tradition or Indigenous/Indian tradition, is still a matter of debate. 14 Having started as a challenge against a conventional Euro-centric dissemination theory among the Victorian generation of European scholars, with a tinge of nationalism, a century of scholarship on the matter brought to light a number of complex problems in chronology and style. 15 Another debate concerning the Classical style in Gandharan art stresses a direct contact with the culture of the Roman Empire, rather than a survival of Hellenistic traditions from the Bactrian Greeks. Hence came the term “Romano-Buddhist” as a new epithet for Gandharan art (Wheeler 1949). Newer assessments yet, simply include further infusions from the Mediterranean world, as well as Iranian, Scythian, Parthian traditions, while downplaying a single source of influence. 16 Grouped under a general term “Asian Hellenism”, these views nevertheless share the same fundamental theoretical framework of Foucher and his followers—ultimately, they are all multifaceted dissemination theories. In the wake of a renewed interest in cross-cultural studies, there is a dire need for newer assessments and understanding of complex cultural interactions that engendered the phenomenon that is Gandhara. This is not to say that an attempt is made here to propose a new theoretical framework of cultural syncretism. Rather, we shall narrow our focus onto a very particular aspect of Gandharan and Kushan-Mathuran art that is more concretely indebted to the Greco-Roman tradition, i.e., the cult of Dionysos and its visual representations. By examining an unmistakably Greco-Roman subject matter being used and adapted to an Indic religious context, we 







14



For example, Rowland 1963, and Franz 1965, 93 adheres to Foucher, while later scholarship tends to complement the two extreme views, such as van Lohuizen–de Leeuw 1981; Cribb 1981 revisits the issue with newer archaeological evidence. For more recent reflections on the history of the problem, see Spagnoli 1995, Taddei 1996, and Taddei 1999. 15 Relatively recent accounts on the origin of the Buddha image may be found in Krishan 1996, who closely follows Coomaraswamy; for a stylistic assessment of Gandharan art, see Nehru 1989; for Kushan chronology, see Cribb 1999, and references therein. 16 Huntington 1999, 110; Nehru 1989.

The Beginnings of the East-West Dialogue

21

might understand further the familiar issues of stylistic and iconographic appropriations and adaptations across cultures, as well as the cultural contexts that enabled such exchanges.

Dionysiac Representations in Gandhara and Kushan-Mathura The exquisitely carved relief pillar from Kushan Mathura in the Cleveland Museum of Art is an excellent “dionysiac oeuvre of north-western Indian art by any standard” (Fig. 1-1). 17 Carved on two adjacent sides, the Cleveland pillar is highly reminiscent of a corner-post of a stone railing surrounding a Buddhist stupa. The exact provenance is, quite typically, unknown, but the red speckled Sikri sandstone is traced to the region of ancient Mathura, south of Delhi (Carter 1982, 249). Its generic qualities, however, ends here, as the Cleveland pillar is more of a unique anomaly than a trend. These “voluptuous Indian Bacchants” are, as once noted, “thoroughly Indian creations, not pale imitations of Hellenism” (Carter 1992, 51). The rounded forms of the body, breasts and facial contours, heavy eyelids and fleshy cheeks, all have the genuine stamp of the Mathuran style. What are then, the elements that still enable us to recognise this oeuvre as distinctively and unmistakably “dionysiac” in the visual tradition of the Classical West? In order to answer this question we shall turn to an instructive comparison with a Greek dionysiac representation par excellence: the exterior decoration of a Classical Greek vase by the painter Makron, dated to mid-fifth century BC (Fig. 1-2). 18 Shown here in a continuous frieze-like arrangement is a group of female figures around the altar and cult image of Dionysos. Such a procession-like revelry of a dionysiac character is termed thiasos. The eleven female revelers (numbered from 1 to 11) assume a variety of poses suggesting dance; their trance-like state induced by wine are evoked by the awkward gestures of their arms and upturned faces, while some of them still hold drinking cups. In addition, their deliberately dishevelled hair, bare feet, and diaphanous, see-through garments visually mark them apart from the ideals of well-behaved, proper, aristocratic Athenian women. The wine-god Dionysos’ human followers, while generically termed bacchantes (or bacchai), are here shown with specific mythical references to maenads—the mythical female followers of the god himself—who have left the comfort of their homes and wander around the 





17 18

Cleveland Museum of Art 1977.34. Berlin Staatliche Museen 2290.



22

Chapter One

mountains in a cultic, wine-induced frenzy. 19 Maenads are conventionally depicted holding their attribute, the thyrsos—a celery stalk—while drinking and dancing, as well as engaging in wild acts such as devouring raw animal flesh. The latter activity is hinted at by the left-most maenad (6), who flaunts a miniature deer figure in one hand, while she proudly holds up the thyrsos across her chest with the other hand. Three other maenads (2, 4 & 8) wield the thyrsos as well. The central dionysiac activity of drinking is alluded to not only by a maenad (7) fondling a drinking cup (skyphos), but also by the firmly grounded vessel (krater) placed under one of the handles, between two maenads (9 & 10) who acknowledge its presence. This large vessel, in which wine was mixed with water, is the centerpiece of the Greek symposium, both visually and practically, as an indispensable anchor around which all Greek drinking activities unfold (Lissarrague 1990). Diluting wine was an essential element of the Greek drinking custom, the importance of which can be sensed in explicit references to that of the foreign “barbarians”, who drank their wine unmixed. 20 The krater thus becomes a symbol of civilization in Greece, so strongly tied with the identity of “Greekness” in their drinking activities, whether symposiastic (banquet imagery), or dionysiac (mythological, or in reference to the cult) in character. The religious or cultic dimension in Makron’s vase is denoted by the altar, next to which stands the cult image of Dionysos, adorned with ivy and fruits attesting to his fertility and power over vegetation and nature. Another important element in dionysiac imagery is music, as shown by the double flute player (11) facing the cult statue. Let us come back to the Cleveland pillar (Fig. 1-1). Despite its stylistic differences, explicit dionysiac references that were noted in the Classical vase are immediately recognizable here. A clear iconographic connection is thus established between the two historically unrelated objects, going well beyond a superficial resemblance simply due to the common motif of drinking. The Cleveland pillar is divided into two vertical sections: lower predella-like panels support the larger main registers with female revelers. The two sides of the predella panels show two independent narrative vignettes, while the upper main register is understood as a continuous frieze of four female figures in revelry. Further up, these revelers give way to a frieze of smaller bust-like musicians, and finally, grape vines in low relief generously crown the top. Allusions to wine, drinking, and merrymaking are thus clear throughout, as is the motif of an all-female, procession-like 



19



For explanations on the term maenad, and finer distinctions from other female followers of Dionysos, see Hedreen 1994. 20 Herodotus 6.84, for example, uses the expression “drink like a Scythian”.

The Beginnings of the East-West Dialogue

23

revelry that is distinctly “dionysiac”. In addition, drinking cups, horns and mixing kraters are placed deliberately as visual anchors reinforcing the context of wine drinking. The repeated motif of the large wine-containing vessel is certainly not accidental, and suggests a continuity in the dionysiac semantics discussed for the Classical Greek context. The notable placing of a sizeable wine-vessel between the two female revelers on the right face of the Cleveland pillar has clear and unmistakable precedents from the Classical world, as we have seen in Fig. 1-2. The lower left-facing predella also shows a large vessel, whose contents are being ladled into a smaller cup by a hunch-back lady. 21 The usage of this vessel on the ground is thus equated to a Greek krater (mixing bowl), and by visual extension, the same should apply to that of the right-facing main panel as well. 22 One can thus easily link the placement of the vessels on the Cleveland pillar visually and semantically to the Makron vase, anchoring the subject matter as revolving around a proper dionysiac context of wine-drinking. 23 Other important dionysiac elements include music-making, depicted here by the upper frieze of bust-like musicians with various instruments of local and foreign, Near-Eastern origin. 24 The key visual focus, however, is none other than the female revelers themselves. These half-nude figures pull frivolously on their diaphanous drapery, giving the artist a chance to render neatly delineated folds created by the tension on the otherwise smooth body-clinging sheets. Such carefully attended drapery has been readily recognised as a clear foreign element, conforming neither to the forms nor style of Mathuran art, and generically characterised by the term “Hellenistic”. Such designation is, as in the case of Gandharan “Apollo-Buddhas”, of course problematic. In fact, the highly stylised rendering of the frills in a calm, almost mechanic and decorative manner, can hardly be called “Hellenistic” according to the convention of western art history, whose tropes include “baroque” excess and richness in style 













21 For the predella scenes as possible allusions to local narratives of Buddhist jataka stories, see Carter 1982, 255. 22 Carter 1982, 249, refers to the vessel in the main register as being reminiscent of the Greek drinking cup (kantharos) associated with Dionysos. This is highly unlikely due to its large size and its placement on the ground, which make it much more akin to the krater in its usage. Its superficial resemblance to a Greek kantharos—two handles and a high stem—is hardly compelling, being more reminiscent of generic metal vessels from the Near East. 23 See Lissarague 1991, 19-46, for a structural analysis of the Greek krater in its context of wine-drinking symposia. 24 One of the musicians plays a triangular harp known as a trigonus, an ancient Near Eastern instrument common in Hellenized Asia; see Deva 1978, 55, pl. 5.11.

24

Chapter One

enabled by deep undercutting drill-work. Rather, could we understand it as a manifestation of the local Mathuran sculptural vocabulary, a stylistic translation of a foreign element? Or, in fact, should we be re-evaluating the line of inquiry itself, i.e., start questioning the pure formalist approach within the art historical discourse? While stylistic differences may subsist, there are fundamental iconographic and formal elements that closely relate the female revelers on the Cleveland pillar to their traditional Greek counterparts. Their gesticulating arms and sweeping legs in processional dance, do in fact clearly recall the “frenzied” state of the maenads shown in Fig. 1-2. The frontal female figure on the right panel of the Cleveland pillar balances a drinking vessel on her head as if to challenge her inebriated state—a pose assumed also by the bottom left figure (5) on the Makron vase. The same Cleveland pillar figure holds in her left hand what looks like a palm branch for a festive occasion. This palm branch could be a direct misquotation of the Greek maenad’s thyrsos, or at least visually indebted to the Classical iconographic tradition. This, if so, coupled with the fact that all revelers on the Cleveland pillar are female, doubly reinforces the dionysiac cultic connotation; maenads are, after all, Dionysos’ cultic practitioners par excellence, and exclusive representations of maenads are fairly routine in the Classical dionysiac repertoire. As for the partial nudity on the Cleveland pillar, precedents can be found locally in voluptuous Yakshi figures that have adorned other Buddhist stupas. Other parallels from the West, and visually striking ones at that, can be found in the contemporary Roman visual tradition, rather than the Greek, where nudity was strictly reserved for hetairai (courtesans) and the goddess Aphrodite. On an exquisite Roman sarcophagus now in Munich, with a typical dionysiac thiasos, we see eye-catching similarities in the back-turned female figure, revealing sensuous curves of her torso (Fig. 1-3). 25 Highly reminiscent of our Mathuran example (far-right figure) also offering her back to the viewer, the Munich reveler extends both arms from which the loosely falling drapery creates a sweeping U-shaped frame for her nude upper body. The diaphanous drapery itself offers a teasing view of the contours of her lower body. Dionysiac revelry was an especially attractive subject for the Roman artists to explore the various viewpoints of the nude female figure; the subtle curves of the nude female form seen from the back were a special favourite in their artistic repertoire, and as we shall see further, popular with Gandharan artists as well. A few other examples in Mathuran sculpture labelled as “dionysiac” 

25

Munich Glyptothek 365 (mid-second century AD).



The Beginnings of the East-West Dialogue

25

may seem pale in comparison to the Cleveland pillar. The so-called “Palikhera block” shows a portly figure seated with a drinking cup, commonly identified with Kubera, the Yaksha-king. 26 He is surrounded by his attendants, one of which holds a drinking cup in the same manner, and another holds a highly stylised grape cluster. Can we, in fact, place a “dionysiac” label on such works that belong not only stylistically but also iconographically to Kushan Mathura? Or should we understand it as a product of a local wine-cult independent of Dionysos altogether? 27 M. Carter takes the middle path, recognising this piece as a testament to the readiness of the local culture for the incoming, foreign cult of Dionysos: Yaksha worship involving drinking rites were already in place, which fostered a religious syncretism that involved Dionysos and his bacchantes with Kubera and his Yakshas (Carter 1968, 123; Carter 1982, 253). She further argues that this put a strong Dionysiac cast to minor deities such as Yakshas and Nagas, who were gradually absorbed into the Buddhist pantheon (Carter 1968, 140-4). The problem, however, rests on establishing a firm Buddhist context for these dionysiac oeuvres. Unfortunately, so few of the extant artefacts from the Kushan period have preserved their archaeological context, as so many have surfaced from undocumented excavations of varying degrees of legality. A noticeable lack of provenance and context for the oeuvres is a regrettable predicament that permeates throughout Kushan scholarship. In most cases therefore, connecting the specific object, be it monumental sculpture or portable items, to an undisputed Buddhist context can be problematic. In the Gandharan tradition, we have a somewhat more substantial corpus of images that has been associated with specific dionysiac references. Although Gandharan artists seem to be more at home with the concept of dionysiac festivities, interestingly none has yet come to light that provide the visual and iconographical parallel or precedence for the exquisite Mathuran pillar with maenad-like figures in a dionysiac thiasos. Most of the Gandharan examples labelled “dionysiac” are frieze-like relief panels populated with evenly spaced figures engaged rather formulaically in either drinking, wine making, or amorous encounters. With very little exception, the archaeological provenances of such Gandharan reliefs are unknown, and thus their Buddhist contexts may be questioned. 28 Allusions 







26





See Rosenfield 1967, 248, Fig. 47, and Carter 1968, 122-3. Balarama is another Indic deity associated with wine and is often portrayed with a drinking cup. 28 An unpublished stupa found in recent excavations at Zar Dheri (Pakistan) shows these so-called “dionysiac” scenes on panels integrated into the relief decorations of 27

26

Chapter One

to drinking, music making and feasting are present, but apart from these studied elements, their relatively calm poses and evenly spaced composition reflect nothing of the frenzied Bacchic revelry in the Classical repertoire. A remarkable Gandharan example of an “amorous” drinking scene can be seen on a statue base in the Lahore Museum in Pakistan. 29 Two couples are seated within a stylised lion frame; the couple on the left is explicitly engaged in drinking. Conventionally considered “bacchanalian”, the scene has been interpreted as amorous dalliance of Yaksha pairs (mithuna), again, in an unspecified Buddhist context, into which they were syncretised. 30 Whatever the label, be it mithunic or bacchanalian, this classic Gandharan relief is particularly important for its prominent display of back-turned female nudes, similar to the right-most figure on the Cleveland pillar. One notices immediately the distinctive way in which the visual focal point is rendered upon the women’s sensually bared backs and buttocks, whose rhythmic curves are further accentuated as they twist to meet the gaze of their frontal male consorts, whose laps they occupy. Indian mithuna figures around this time, on the other hand, usually display the female body in frontal view. The visual continuity displayed in these bared backs of Gandharan female consorts with a certain Roman iconographic tradition is rather striking, the details of which are reserved for future study. Especially pertinent is the relief sculpture on Roman sarcophagi bearing the name “marine thiasoi”, whose descriptive label literally reflects the conception that they are, most simply put, dionysiac thiasoi transplanted onto the sea. All the characteristics of dionysiac revelry prevail, only now we have sea nymphs, or Nereids, riding marine-centaurs or tritons, in lieu of maenads consorting with satyrs, their dionysiac counterparts on land. The visual echo seen in the seated, back-turned Nereids on Roman sarcophagi and the Gandharan bacchantes in Lahore is rather uncanny: the drapery drops down to reveal the curves of their strapped backs and bare buttocks, and the raised arms placed around the shoulder of their companions makes the torso twist gradually to reveal their faces in full profile. It is rather interesting to note that the characteristic Odalisquean portrayal of back-turned female figures is not common in the general 







the stupa. O. Bopearachchi, paper presented at the ISAW, New York University, 9 December 2009. 29 Lahore Museum, No. 1914 (statue base, schist, w. 76.8 cm); see Carter 1982, Fig. 14. 30 Carter 1982, 253; Carter 1968, 128-9, bases this reading on other amorous drinking couples from the accessory figures at Sanchi, which, although similar in content, show very little visual and stylistic parallels.

The Beginnings of the East-West Dialogue

27

Roman artistic repertoire; rather, it seems to be a distinctive iconographic device associated with sea-creature riding Nereids. There are strong indications that the visual similarities in the back-turned females observed in the Gandharan and Roman oeuvres are not a mere coincidence. The artists of northern India would have indeed been familiar with this particular visual tradition mostly by ways of portable goods: for example, the so-called Gandharan “toilet trays” found in abundance in sites such as Taxila. A number of such items carry the motif of a single sea-nymph riding side-saddle atop a sea-creature, with her back facing out towards the viewer. Various contacts between the Roman Empire and the Indian subcontinent are well attested. Numerous Roman coins have surfaced in Indian excavations, and goods were traded both ways, as witnessed with the famous Indic ivory figurine found in Pompeii (Suresh 2004; D’Ancona 1950). Another typical motif from Roman sarcophagi, that of the clipeus imago (medallion portrait), has recently put to comparison with Gandharan Buddhist funerary iconography (Srinivasan 2006). That is certainly not to say that our Kushan dionysiac representations are indebted specifically to the Roman tradition. On the contrary, we may even turn the question around and ask: What has the Kushans contributed to the artistic koine of dionysiac representations as a whole in the Indo-European context? The complexity of the problem intensifies as one considers the origins of the cult of Dionysos itself; the scholarly debates regarding his foreign identity in the Greek pantheon explore cultic links back to the Near East, and even according to some, an ancient Vedic Soma cult in India. Adding even more layers to the problem is the belief that later Roman sources adapted Dionysos’ myth on the model of Alexander’s conquest to India (Evans 1988, 128; Dalby 2003, 153-4). 31 That being said, we shall conclude with a few reflections on the cultic significance of Dionysos known in the Classical world and how it might bear on our Western Asiatic context. Although speculative, there may be a symbolic link between cultic and eschatological symbolisms of dionysiac representation in Roman sarcophagi and certain aspects of Buddhist thought and practice. Especially in the wake of Mahayana Buddhism, where strong preoccupations with death and the afterlife, and the concept of a living paradise grew, specific funerary symbolisms of dionysiac bliss, and the soteriological character of the chthonic god, may have indeed found home in Buddhist circles. 32 A related, notable example is the chthonic hero par excellence, Herakles, who 





31



Nonnos Dionysiaka (fourth century AD) describes Dionysos’ Indian invasion in much detail; it is also recounted by Pausanias and Diodorus Siculus, the same authors in Roman times attesting to Alexander’s Indian campaign. 32 See Tanabe 2003 for further reflections.

28

Chapter One

apparently transmigrated into the iconography of Gandharan Vajrapani, one of the main attendants of the Buddha and protector of the Faith (Flood 1989). As the “Heraklean” Vajrapani wields his thunderbolt rather than a club, while still wearing his lion skin, we see the origins of Vajrapani in the Greek martial hero with superhuman strength, whose image has always enjoyed its popularity among the Indo-Greek royalty. 33 When pursuing this line of inquiry, however, as mentioned previously, one must bear in mind the need to establish a concrete connection of such “dionysiac” oeuvres to a Buddhist context, whether through archaeology or iconography. Without such tangible connections, ideological speculations regarding the Dionysiac cult and Buddhism will remain unsubstantiated. Finally, we come to the north-western fringes of our Greater Gandharan realm, where the relatively recent Tillya Tepe excavations in northern Afghanistan yielded remarkable finds regarding our subject (Schiltz 2008). Series of tombs were found of nomadic burials around the time of Christ, which may geographically as well as temporally provide us with a more concrete link between the Hellenistic and Roman West, and Kushan Gandhara. The golden belt with medallions and turquoise inlaid pair of clasps are but a few stunning examples of many locally produced ornaments with Classical motifs, found in situ on the body of the deceased. 34 The belt consists of braided gold chains that link a total of nine stunning gold medallions, on which the slim Asiatic-looking Dionysos rides his panther side-saddle in the posture of “royal ease”, while holding a drinking cup. On the turquoise inlaid pair of clasps, each reflecting the other in mirror image, Dionysos is now shown mounted on a hybrid monster with his consort Ariadne. The latter is being crowned by Nike from the back (very common Greco-Roman iconography), while the former benevolently pours wine through a drinking horn held up to the mouth of a satyr-like figure, who leans back under the god’s mount and is ready to consume the wine about to flow through the horn. Although the Classical content is clear to anyone familiar with Greco-Roman dionysiac representations, distinct idiosyncratic elements in both iconography and style visibly mark them apart from typical Greco-Roman productions. Neither piece, therefore, is an apology for imitating Hellenism; rather, it seems to be a testament to the cult of Dionysos being fully integrated and adopted to their own use in the funerary sphere. Dated securely to before mid-first century AD based on numismatic finds, these tombs whose owners may indeed be of the Yuezhi, the nomadic ancestors of the Kushans, may provide us with a missing link, 





33 34

For numismatic examples, see Flood 1989, 18. Schiltz 2008, catalogue nos. 107, 136.



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and enlighten us further on the quest for our Asiatic Dionysos. 35 

Works Cited Brancaccio, Pia and Kurt Behrendt, eds. 2006. Gandharan Buddhism. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press. Behrendt, Kurt. 2004. The Buddhist Architecture of Gandhara. Leiden, Boston: Brill. Carter, Martha L. 1968. Dionysiac Aspects of Kushan Art. Ars Orientalis 7: 121-46. —. 1982. The Bacchants of Mathura: New Evidence of Dionysiac Yaksha Imagery from Kushan Mathura. Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 69, 8: 247-57. —. 1992. Dionysiac Festivals and Gandharan Imagery. In Banquets d’orient (Res Orientales IV), ed. Rika Gyselen, 51-60. Bures-sur-Yvette: Group pour l’étude de la Civilisation du Moyen-Orient. Coomaraswamy, Ananda. 1927. The Origin of the Buddha Image. Art Bulletin 9, 4: 1-43. Cribb, Joe. 1981. The Origin of the Buddha Image: The Numismatic Evidence. In South Asian Archaeology 1981, ed. Bridget Allchin, 231-44. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. —. 1999. The Early Kushan Kings. In Coins, Art and Chronology, ed. Michael Alram and Deborah E. Klimburg-Salter, 177-206. Vienna: Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften. Dalby, Andrew. 2003. Bacchus: A Biography. Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum. D’Ancona, Mirella Levi. 1950. An Indian Statuette from Pompeii. Artibus Asiae 13, 3:166-80. Deva, Chaitanya B. 1978. Musical Instruments of India. Calcutta: Firma KLM. Errington, Elizabeth, and Joe Cribb, eds. 1992. Crossroads of Asia: Transformation in Image and Symbol in the Art of Ancient Afghanistan and Pakistan. Cambridge: Ancient India and Iran Trust. Errington, Elizabeth. 1999. Rediscovering the Collections of Charles Masson. In Coins, Art, and Chronology, ed. Michael Alram and Deborah E. Klimburg-Salter, 207-38. Vienna: Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften. Evans, Arthur. 1988. The God of Ecstasy: Sex-Roles and the Madness of Dionysos. New York: St. Martin’s Press. 35

For dating the Tillya Tepe tombs, see Schiltz 2008, 225-9.

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Faxian, A Record of Buddhistic Kingdoms. Trans. James Legge. New York: Cosimo, 2005. Flood, F. B. 1989. Herakles and the ‘Perpetual Acolyte’ of the Buddha: Some Observations on the Iconography of Vajrapani in Gandharan Art. South Asian Studies 5: 17-27. Foucher, Alfred. 1905-1951. L’art Greco-bouddhique du Gandhara:étude sur les origines de l’influence Classique dans l’art Bouddhique de l’Inde et de l’Extrême-Orient. 3 Vols. Paris: E. Leroux. —. 1913. L’origine Grecque de l’image du Bouddha. Annales du Musée Guimet 38: 231-72. Franz, Heinrich Gerhard. 1965. Buddhistische Kunst Indiens. Leipzig: Seemann. Fussman, Gérard. 1987. Numismatic and Epigraphic Evidence for the Chronology of Early Gandharan Art. In Investigating Indian Art, ed. W. Lobo and M. Yaldiz, 67-88. Berlin: Staatliche Museen Preussischer Kulturbesitz. Göbl, Robert. 1984. Munzpragung des Kusanreiches. Vienna: Verlag Der Osterreichischen Akademie Der Wissenschaften. Hedreen, Guy. 1994. Silens, Nymphs, and Maenads. The Journal of Hellenic Studies 114: 47-69. Herodotus, The Histories. Trans. Aubrey de Sélincourt. Penguin. 2003. Hiebert, Fredrik, and Pierre Cambon eds. 2008. Afghanistan: Hidden Treasures from the National Museum, Kabul. Washington D.C.: National Geographic Society. Huntington, Susan L. 1999. The Art of Ancient India. New York: Weatherhill. Krishan, Yuvraj. 1996. The Buddha Image: Its Origin and Development. New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers. Lissarrague, François. 1990. The Aesthetics of the Greek Banquet: Images of Wine and Ritual. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Matz, Friedrich. 1968. Die Dionysischen Sarkophage, Vol. 2. Berlin: Gebr. mann Verlag. Megasthenes, Indika. ed. and trans. John W. McCrindle, Ancient India as Described by Megasthenes and Arrian. Austin: Maluka Publishing, 2008. Nehru, Lolita. 1989. Origins of the GandhƗran Style: A Study of Contributory Influences. Delhi: Oxford University Press. Nonnos, Dionysiaka. Trans. W.H.D. Rouse. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1940. Philostratos, The Life and Times of Apollonius of Tyana. Trans. Charles P. Eells. Standford: Stanford University Publications, 1923.

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Rosenfield, John. 1967. The Dynastic Arts of the Kushans. Berkeley: University of California Press. Rowland, Benjamin Jr. 1963. The Evolution of the Buddha Image. New York: Abrams. Salomon, Richard. 1999. Ancient Buddhist Scrolls from Gandhara: The British Library Kharosthi Fragments. Seattle: University of Washington Press. Schiltz, Véronique. 2008. Tillya Tepe, the Hill of Gold: A Nomad Necropolis. In Afghanistan, ed. F. Hiebert and P. Cambon, 219-93. Washington D.C.: National Geographic Society. Spagnoli, M. 1995. Note Sulla Genesi Figurativa del Buddha Gandharico. Rivista degli Studi Orientali LXIX, 3-4: 429-45. Srinivasan, Doris Meth. 2006. From Roman Clipeata Imago to Gandharan Image Medallion and Embellishments of the Parinirvana Legend. In Architects, Master Builders, Craftsmen: Work-yard Organization and Artistic Production in Hellenistic Asia (D. Faccenna Festschrift), ed. Pierfranceso Callieri, 247-69. Rome: IsIAO. Suresh, S. 2004. Symbols of Trade: Roman and Pseudo-Roman Objects found in India. Delhi: Manohar. Taddei, Maurizio. 1980. Buddha e Apollo. Le Grandi Avventure dell’archeologia 6: 1943-64. Reprinted 2003, in Maurizio Taddei on Gandhara: Collected Articles, ed. Verardi and Filigenzi, 229-54. Naples. —. 1996. Ancora sul Buddha Gandharico: Premesse ad una Discussione. Annali dell’Istituto Orientale di Napoli 56, 3: 407-17. Reprinted 2003, in Maurizio Taddei on Gandhara: Collected Articles, ed. Verardi and Filigenzi, 423-42. Naples. —. 1999. The Buddha Image. In L’arte del Buddhimso dall’India alla Cina, ed. R. Freschi, 4-8. Milan. Reprinted 2003, in Maurizio Taddei on Gandhara: Collected Articles, ed. Verardi and Filigenzi, 497-502. Naples. Tanabe, Katsumi. 2003. The Earliest Paramita Imagery of Gandharan Buddhist Reliefs—A New Interpretation of the So-called Dionysiac Imagery. Silk Road Art and Archaeology 9: 87-105. Xuanzang, Si-Yu-Ki: Buddhist Records of the Western World. 2 Vols. Trans. Samuel Beal. London: Truübner and Co., 1884. van Lohuizen-de Leeuw, Johanna E. 1981. New Evidence with regard to the Origin of the Buddha Image. In South Asian Archaeology 1979, ed. Herbert Härtel, 377-400. Berlin: D. Reimer Verlag. Wheeler, R. E. Mortimer. 1949. Romano-Buddhist: An Old Problem Restated. Antiquity 89: 4-19.

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Zwalf, Wladimir. 1996. A Catalogue of the GandhƗra Sculpture in the British Museum, Vol. 1. London: British Museum Press.

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Fig. 1-1. Railing Pillar. India, Mathura, Kushan period (first century-320 AD), 100s. Red sandstone. Height: 80cm. The Cleveland Museum of Art. John L. Severance Fund 1977.34.

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Fig. 1-2. Exterior view of an Athenian red-figure drinking cup by Makron, mid-fifth century BC. Berlin Staatliche Museen 2290. Illustration drawn by the author.

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Fig. 1-3. Female figure on a Roman Dionysiac Sarcophagus, second century AD. Munich Glyptothek 365. Illustration drawn by the author from Matz 1968, pl. 98.

CHAPTER TWO EARLY GLOBAL ENCOUNTERS AS MOTOR OF VISUAL LANGUAGE CHANGE: THE CASE OF MEDIEVAL FRANCE 1 

ANJA EISENBEISS

Cultural Globalisation before Modernity? Current debates on globalisation and its impacts on the creation, circulation and presentation of art works, whether praised or condemned, usually concentrate on modernity (Belting and Buddensieg 2009). Popular culture, mass media and an ever accelerating speed in the exchange of people, ideas and images between places all over the world further such thinking. They also raise the question: if and to what extent growing cultural homogeneity fosters the emergence of global icons, i.e., a uniform visual language capable of transcending local, regional and national frameworks. 2 Less common is an understanding of globalisation as a dynamic process rather than a static condition—to use the words of David Armitage (2004). Processual thinking in this context accommodates the insight that globalisation occurs in varied intensities and at different speeds in different places. Cultural homogeneity, in this respect, turns into a prospect never fully reachable in practice. But most of all, such an approach allows one to research the pre-history of globalisation, for some of the processes at work can be traced in earlier societies, as has been fruitfully discussed for the exchange of art objects between Europe and its Eastern neighbours in the 

1



Research for this article has been conducted within the Cluster of Excellence Asia and Europe in a Global Context: Shifting Asymmetries in Cultural Flows at Heidelberg University, funded by the German federal and state governments to promote science and research at German universities (Excellence Initiative). I am grateful to Dr Adalbert Saurma, Heidelberg, for his comments on an earlier version of this paper. 2 For a recent study with further references, see Haustein 2008, esp. Chapter 5 on globalisation and the arts.

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Renaissance (Jardine and Brotton 2000, 1-62). As a key feature, processes operating in an age of globalisation 3 tend to reach out beyond local communities, usually fuelled by advancement in transportation or communication infrastructure, but also by a quest to conquer new territories or to acquire hitherto unknown knowledge (Delacruz 2009, 9). To borrow from James Clifford (1997, 3), the routes along which people, commodities, art objects and knowledge cross the continents become as important in constituting cultural meanings as civilisation or national histories, i.e., ancestral roots. 4 This also implies a change in perspective from a vertical to a horizontal axis of understanding where no regions or people are privileged over another. In consequence, art historical analysis has recently seen a shift from the art object as signifying local, regional or national traits, to the object as agent with the power to transform societies as it moves between places (Miller 2008, 39). 5 Due to its reciprocity, the notion of cross-cultural exchange thus increasingly supersedes more traditional concepts of influence, much criticised for promoting a one-way movement from an active, giving side to a passive, mostly receiving side. 6 In medieval studies, this also implies a geographical shift of interest from the allegedly all-dominant centres of Western art production to the periphery, to borderlands, like Muslim Spain, the Mediterranean, or the Near East, where close contact with the cultural Other in everyday life guaranteed a vivid exchange of goods and ideas (Ovadiah and Kennan-Kedar 1998; Cutler 2009; Dangler 2005). When it comes to global approaches in the field of art history, the new awareness for hitherto wrongly marginalised regions and their art production right from the midst of cross-cultural encounters and border-crossings now tends to marginalise those places formerly understood as centres. This is especially true for the art production at the centres of Latin Christianity if Latin Christianity is to be understood as a closed system of beliefs which enhances universalism in faith, government and culture rather than 









3







Armitage (2004, esp. 165) differentiates between the dynamic processes active in an age of globalisation and the static condition of a globalised age, a crucial distinction when it comes to transnational approaches in historical studies. 4 The adaptability of Clifford’s concept of routes versus roots for the study of medieval art is discussed by Flood (2009, 1-5) with regard to India. 5 On this topic, see also the contributions to Saurma-Jeltsch and Eisenbeiß 2010, esp. the introduction by Lieselotte E. Saurma-Jeltsch (2010, 10-22). 6 Baxandall (1985) fiercely criticises such a concept of influence when it comes to discuss the interactions among artists. In his paper given at Columbus University in 2005, James Cahill expands Baxandall’s critique to the analysis of cross-cultural transmissions. For further references, see Baader 2003.

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diversity. In such a system, based on the homogeneity of its people, diversity must be understood as a threat, as something which has to be opposed by means of either total assimilation or exclusion. 7 This paper assumes that a growing awareness of cultural entanglements also suits enriching the understanding of visual concepts devised in locations which frequently cite cross-cultural encounters rather than being the site of their de facto occurrence, 8 and thus takes a somewhat different point of departure. It will look at Paris, one of the foremost centres of Western medieval art production, where a growing interest in the depiction of Eastern clothing, textiles and objects can be traced in the years around 1400 and the first decades of the fifteenth century. A textbook example of this taste for Orientalising 9 images is a miniature from Thomas of Saluzzo’s (1356-1416) allegorical poem Le Chevalier Errant, showing the Princes of the East summoned by Dame Fortune in a camp (Fig. 2-1). 10 The enormous variety of Oriental garment represented in this picture, its high accuracy in detail and the effort thus made to distinguish between the various people of Asia and Africa transcend by far earlier attempts to depict Eastern people in French painting. Joyce Kubiski, who has thoroughly analysed the miniature (2001, 162-9), points out two events, which could have fostered the Parisian workshop’s knowledge of Eastern garment and people: 1) the Battle of Nicopolis in 1396 (Bak 1993, 1191), in which a conjoint Christian army, led by the king of Hungary and future Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund (1368-1437), was defeated by the Ottoman sultan BƗyezƯd I (1360-1403); and 2) the diplomatic mission of the Byzantine Emperor Manuel II (1350-1425) to Paris in the years 1400-2, which aimed at building a new 











7



For a critical approach and corrections to this theory, see Nederman 2000, 1-23, esp. 5, 11-8, and 20-2. 8 The helpful and thought-provoking distinction between citing and siting encounters was first introduced by Birchwood and Dimmock (2005, 4-9). 9 The term is used in the sense indicated by Akbari (2009, 1-19) who points to the interwovenness of religious and geographical imaginations of the East in medieval times, so that the Orient might—at the same time—evoke fear and fascination among a Western audience. For further reading on the concept of a medieval Orientalism, especially with regard to exoticism, see Strickland (2005, 495; 2008, esp. 69-70). 10 Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France (hereafter cited as BnF), Ms. fr. 12559, fol. 162. On the opposite page (fol. 161v), the Princes of the West are depicted in a similar setting, which indicates that both miniatures should be seen together. For a text edition, see Ward (1984), who also describes the miniatures of Ms. fr. 12559, which are ascribed to the Cité des Dames Master (Meiss 1974, 1: 14-6, 381, and 2: fig. 18, the Princes of the West; Sterling 1987-90, 1: 287-95).

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Christian coalition against BƗyezƯd. 11 Whereas in the latter case the Emperor’s entourage was visible in the streets of Paris, the experience of Nicopolis is one which mostly affected the French elite, the noblemen and knights who not only met the Ottomans on the battlefield, but afterwards spent time in Ottoman custody. When they returned home, they might have brought objects from the East with them and presumably some idea of life in an Ottoman surrounding. 12 Both, the traumatic experience of defeat and, at the same time, a fascination with Eastern culture helped to stimulate a new crusader mentality among the very same elite which ordered illuminated manuscripts (Strickland 2005, 496). This framework turns Paris—for a distinct moment in time—into a contact zone, 13 where different cultures interact with each other either physically or intellectually. But it does not necessarily account for a change in the visual repertoire of Parisian ateliers. Nor do all ateliers change their repertoire, or use a changed repertoire for all the miniatures which they produce. Therefore, a difference has to be made between the possibility of knowing about other cultures and the interest in broaching this knowledge as an issue in a way which sustainably affects the visual vocabulary. To what extent the preoccupation with Eastern motifs actually changes the visual language of French illumination in the years around 1400 will now be discussed in more detail. 













Dynamics of Visual Language Change Transformations of a painter’s visual repertoire due to increasing cultural contacts—or its consistency despite such an increase—can best be analysed when looking at a set of pictures which, by way of their subject matter, would not necessarily ask for integrating Eastern motifs. The illuminations to Saint Augustine’s City of God suit this purpose. Raoul de Presles (1316-82) translated the church father’s fifth-century text into the French vernacular by order of King Charles V (1338-80) in 1371-5. Added were an extensive commentary and a visual cycle, which was to be copied and transformed in the subsequent decades. By the turn of the fifteenth 11

Manuel intercepted his stay in Paris for a journey to London, where he tried to win the support of King Henry IV (Barker 1969, 123-99, esp. 172-6). 12 The difficulties of tapping the exact sources of knowledge and ways of transmission are analysed more thoroughly by Kubiski (2001, 174-6). 13 For a critical discussion of the term, see Uebel 2005, 39-44. He stresses the impact of imagination in defining how the Other should be addressed, which is at least as important as face-to-face contact and often formed long before an actual encounter takes place.

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century, the City of God had become one of the most popular readings among French princes and aristocracy. At least one copy of the two-volume work can be found in almost every prestigious library of the time. 14 The second book of the City of God outlines Augustine’s main objective: writing in the early fifth century AD, he had to invalidate charges against Christianity, which held the young religion responsible for the fall of the Roman Empire. The book lists numerous examples for the moral decline of the Roman people stemming from times well before the advent of Christ. Not only did the pagan gods do nothing to save their adherents from effeminacy, they even asked for excessive feasts to be held in their honour. They would also tolerate theatre performances, making mock of them. At least this is how Augustine built up his argument. The Parisian workshop of the Virgil Master begins Augustine’s second book with the depiction of a musical performance (Fig. 2-2). 15 The musicians stand on an elevated stage, formed like a pulpit and surrounded by a circular bench on which the male audience is seated. While this structure in a way resembles Raoul de Presles’ description of the small building with a lectern found in the middle of a Roman theatre, 16 the image as a whole does not have much in common with his detailed remarks nor with antique theatres as displayed in contemporary manuscripts like the famous Terence du Duc. 17 In the City of God manuscript, the illuminator 







14










Today, fifty-seven illuminated copies of the French City of God are known, the earliest being the version done for Charles V in 1376 (Paris, BnF, Ms. fr. 22912-3), the latest dating from the early sixteenth century. The seminal reading on this group of manuscripts is Laborde (1909); for more recent studies, see Smith 1974; Smith 1982; and Villela-Petit 2006. 15 Paris, BnF, Ms. fr. 6272, fol. 33. The workshop reuses the miniature with only slight variations as opening for the third book (fol. 72; reproduced in Villela-Petit 2006, 24), which might have happened by mistake. For a catalogue of Ms. fr. 6272, see Smith 1974, 209-11, 257-9 for the second volume of this copy: The Hague, Museum Meermanno-Westreenianum, Ms. 10 A 12. 16 “ascena … est une petite maison ou milieu du theatre en laquelle avoit ung letrin ou len lisoit les tragedies et comedies des poetes … Et y avoit ioueurs de divers instrumens et autres qui se desguisoient et contrefaisoient les personnes de qui la tragedie ou comedie parloit” (Augustinus 1486, vol. 1, book 1.31, p. D5). For an English translation, see Meiss 1974, 1: 52. A critical edition of Raoul de Presles’ text is currently prepared by Olivier Bertrand, University of Nancy, France. 17 Paris, BnF, Ms. lat. 7907 A, fol. 2v, Paris, 1407-12 (reproduced in Sterling 1987-90, 1: 326). Meiss (1974, 1: 50-4, and 2: fig. 208-18) comments on this miniature in conjunction with his discussion of French humanism and antiquity. Raoul de Presles’ extensive description in the City of God (Book 1.31) must be ranged among the important sources for the iconography of the Roman theatre in

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does not picture any actors, or the antique architectural setting. Here the focus is on the audience. The bearded men, who are mostly shown from the back, wear colourful garment and exotic headgear. Some of their turbans and fanciful hats are related to those represented by the Cité des Dames Master (Fig. 2-1), especially when looking at details like the golden embroidery on the cloth of the white turbans. The embroidered band worn around the upper arm by the man right in the centre alludes to the tirƗz, which is frequently used in Western art to mark a person’s Eastern origin (Snyder 2004). 18 Despite such accuracy in detail, headgear and garment do scarcely form a unified whole in this miniature. The overall impression is that of a fanciful Orientalness rather than a “sartorial portrait(s) of distinct ethnicities” (Kubiski 2001, 163; with reference to the Cité des Dames Master’s astonishing naturalism). Clothing the protagonists of a historical distant past in Oriental garment might in the City of God manuscript be understood as a strategy to mark their difference. At the same time, the practice of fashioning the Romans—that is the heathens of antiquity—as Muslims, transforms them into the pagans of the time. Thus, the gap between the fifth-century text and its early fifteenth-century readers is bridged, and an example taken from ancient history procures a contemporary experience of paganism. 19 Of course, there exist various strategies to arrange Augustine’s text for a late medieval audience, of which not all hark back to an Orientalised visual repertoire. 20 Some workshops translate the feast held in honour of the pagan gods into the kind of feast most familiar to a fifteenth-century aristocrat, i.e., a tournament. These miniatures do not show any Oriental motifs, but a 









early fifteenth-century Paris, even though the pictures most closely relying on his comment were not produced for the City of God. 18 On the use of this popular adornment in Arabic vesture, see Stillman 2000, 120-37, esp. 120-1. 19 Depending on the motifs used, either temporal or spatial distance can be stressed. While the Virgil Master emphasises religious Otherness, linked with the East and Muslims, the same scene in the version of the Boethius Master (Paris, BnF, Ms. fr. 20, fol. 25; reproduced in Villela-Petit 2006, 25) accentuates the archaic element by reducing openly Oriental garment in favour of a broadly timeless, thus antiquarian type of clothing. 20 For recent research on the adaptation of historical texts for a contemporary audience, especially their translations into visual images, see Hedeman 2008 (concentrating on Boccaccio’s De casibus); Morrison and Hedeman 2010 (an exhibition catalogue on imagining the past in late medieval French manuscript illumination); Strickland 2005 (focused on a distinct literary genre, namely medieval travel literature); and Sandler 2010 (who analyses the relation between patrons and artists using the example of the English Bohun family).

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combat on foot with heralds, trumpeters and spectators. 21 Other ateliers dislocate the performance from the theatre to the market of a contemporary city, which would have been the place of choice for staging a medieval play. 22 In these pictures, the focus is on the influence which the performance exerts on the behaviour of a mixed audience of men and women. While the actors on the stage, usually dressed in golden garment, could be mistaken for pagan idols, the spectators court each other shamelessly. 23 Only some of the men wear Oriental headgear and scimitars, while most of the women appear as elegantly dressed French ladies. However, they do not behave accordingly. Past and present, domestic and foreign features are inextricably entangled in such miniatures, making it impossible to divide between positive or negative characters along the line of clothing. The scene as a whole is to be understood as an example of wrong behaviour provoked by scenic games. In such a context, the addition of Eastern garment and objects is but one visual strategy among others to highlight the intended “reading” of the picture. Almost as important are the use of gestures and body language, as well as the chosen setting, which—seen together—make up the vocabulary of a complex visual language. The refinement of the Parisian workshops becomes obvious when looking at the same scene in a manuscript that was most probably illuminated in northern France in the years around 1403-5 (Fig. 2-3). 24 The exceptional iconography chosen for the opening of Augustine’s second book is unique among the illuminated copies of the City of God and sets forth a more traditional way of using Oriental motifs. Here the column picture is divided into two registers. The upper tier shows a scene of pagan 













21



One of the first manuscripts beginning the second book with the depiction of a combat on foot is Brussels, Bibliothèque Royale de Belgique, Ms 9005, fol. 32v, illuminated at about 1420-35 by a Flemish workshop familiar with Parisian visual cycles (Gaspar and Lyna 1987, 2: 40-5, Pl. CXXV). 22 Paris, Bibliothèque de l’Arsenal, Ms. 5060, fol. 27, ascribed to the Valerius Maximus Master and dated at about 1425 (Smith 1974, 223-6; Camille [1989] 1995, 61-2; Meiss 1974, 2: fig. 208). A close version of the scene can be found in Brussels, Bibliothèque Royale de Belgique, Ms 9013, fol. 23, illuminated in Paris, 1420-30. 23 In Book 2.4, Augustine describes in detail the lack of restraint typical for pagan celebrations, which compromise the chastity of women in the audience (Augustinus 1486, vol. 1, p. E3). 24 Boulogne-sur-Mer, Bibliothèque municipal, Ms. 55 I, fol. 37v. Nothing is known about the manuscript’s first owner, but in the seventeenth century the volume belonged to the Abbey of Saint-Vaast in Arras (Laborde 1909, 1: 296-301, no. 24). For further references, see Smith 1974, 182-8.

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idolatry which involves animal sacrifice, 25 while the courting of women is subject to the lower tier. The registers are visually linked by the recurrence of fashionably dressed men in both tiers and by the presence of demons. These three devilish creatures, ostensibly extrinsic to the narration, are not only able to cross the picture’s frame but also move between the registers. Each of them turns towards one of the miniature’s distinct scenes, so that they become interconnected as episodes of the same story. This is essential because the heathens who offer a rabbit and another animal to the idols wear Eastern-looking headgear together with timeless tunics and long beards, while the two younger men to the right, absorbed in a conversation, as well as the ladies and their beaus in the lower tier are clothed in contemporary French courtly dress. 26 Were it not for the demons, one would not expect these people to be immediately influenced by idolatrous practices, nor do they visually belong to the same world as the idolaters. This intriguing combination of scenes and characters leads back to the question of how the illuminators use Eastern motifs. The paragraphs of Augustine’s text dedicated to the pagan gods who ask for immoral practices to be performed in their honour are here translated into an image of idolatry, 27 as it was common in Western illumination at least since the twelfth century. Showing a turban or Eastern-looking hat in this context does not require any firsthand knowledge or thorough interest in Eastern costume. Instead, it forms part of the cited iconographical pattern. The same is true for the architectural setting. While the hexagon stone roof, which 





25







Augustine mentions the practice in Book 2.2: “Et mesmement a ceulx par especial qui mettent sur la flesche destruction de romme al la religion crestienne par la quelle il leur est deffendu de servir aux deables de si vilains sacrifices et adourer les ydoles” (Augustinus 1486, vol. 1, p. E1v). 26 Although the two men in the upper register resemble those courting the women, the persons are not necessarily the same. Their elegant garment, especially the short, fitted jerkin, the voluminous sleeves and the chaperon, but also the high hat reappear in representations of a courtly society like the leaf for the month of April in the Très Riches Heures (Chantilly, Musée Condé, Ms. 65, fol. 4v) and other works connected with the Limbourg brothers; for reproductions, see Dückers and Roelofs 2005, 206: fig. 20, and p. 254-5; a silverpoint showing an elegant company, Uppsala, Universitet Biblioteker. 27 This religious practice was stereotypically linked to Saracens, i.e., Muslims, who stand in for all kinds of heathens, be it Romans or Jews, the latter especially when animal sacrifice is involved. For a recent discussion of the origin of this stereotype and its implication on Christian self-fashioning, see Akbari 2009, 200-47, esp. 203-21. See also Strickland 2003, 165-8; Camille [1989] 1995, 129-64, and figs. 58, 59, 79, for examples of idolatry connected with animal sacrifice.

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spans the altar, might allude to a centralised sanctuary, 28 the affiliated buildings, especially the portal to the right with its two onion domes, add a touch of Easterness to the scene. Consequently, the two fashionably dressed men in front of the portal would appear somewhat misplaced, were it not for the courting scene below, in which they reappear in a slightly altered manner. Compared to images of courtly love, 29 the harsh grasp, with which the two men capture the ladies’ arms, and the decidedness they show to tear the group of females apart, disclose their ignoble intent. 30 So does the demon, which overlooks the scene. The negative connotation is obvious without marking all the protagonists as religious or ethnic others. It suffices to visually interconnect the various parts of the picture, so that the viewer will understand the men’s behaviour as consequence stemming from wrong religious practices. 











Conclusion The brief survey of possibilities for illuminating only one scene in the City of God nevertheless allows some insights into the visual vocabulary used by French painters in the years around 1400 and the early fifteenth 28

Widespread are allusions to the temple of Salomon, one of the best known and most referred to central-plan buildings in medieval times (Naredi-Rainer 1994, 90-102). In a copy of the Postilla litteralis of Nicolaus de Lyra from Hainaut, dated to the years 1450-75, the Jewish altar of burnt offering of the tabernacle shows a hexagon floor plan as substructure for a ciborium, which is the prevalent architectural type and far more common than the stone roof shown in the Boulogne-sur-Mer miniature (The Hague, Koninklijke Bibliotheek, 128 C 8, fol. 6; reproduced in National Library of the Netherlands and Museum Meermanno, “Medieval illuminated manuscripts,” http://www.kb.nl/manuscripts/). Akbari discusses the interdependence of Muslim and Jewish features in Christian representations of these religions (2009, 112-54, esp. 113-4). 29 See the examples listed in note 26 above and Camille 1998, esp. figs. 29-30, 39-44, 80. 30 The forcefulness of the scene conjures up the negative example of the Sabine women whom the Romans had invited on the pretext of watching a play, only to abduct them. Manuscripts of the City of God which begin the second book with this subject mentioned in Chapter 17 usually locate the events outside the city walls and show a knight or a knightly army which leads away the captured women. See for instance the copy kept in The Hague, Koninklijke Bibliotheek, 72 A 22, fol. 33v, dated 1400-10. For a reproduction, see National Library of the Netherlands and Museum Meermanno, “Medieval illuminated manuscripts,” http://www.kb.nl/manuscripts/. The scene is also depicted in three manuscripts of the BnF: Ms. fr. 23, fol. 27v; Ms. fr. 27, fol. 28; and Ms. fr. 172, fol. 27.

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century. In a time when the Near East, boosted by Ottoman military supremacy and intensive trade relations, preoccupied the imagination of people in the heartlands of Christianity in one way or the other, broaching the issue of Easterness in the artistic production should be seen as one possibility among others, not as a necessity. While all kinds of foreign people could be fashioned as Muslims, be it historical, fictional or current, positive, negative or neutral characters, the same people could come along as contemporary Frenchmen. There are few literary genres like travelogues (Strickland 2005) or themes like idolatry and paganism which would constantly ask for the presence of Orientalised protagonists. In the latter case, illuminators usually cite stereotypical images that form part of the iconographical patterns which are easily available for a Parisian or French workshop of the time. They could be added to pictures without any thorough knowledge of Eastern culture. Nevertheless, intensified preoccupations and exchanges with the East in the years around 1400 create a stimulating atmosphere among the patrons of art works and the audience alike, in which—on the side of the illuminators—lies the potential to fructify this discourse in order to disperse a somewhat consolidated visual vocabulary. Consequently, the visual repertoire can be enriched with a bunch of new motifs beyond the use of handed-down stereotypes. Stereotypes can even be refigured. Employing Orientalised features in such a sense leads to a gradual change of the visual language as a whole. 31 New visual strategies will occur. These are not limited to certain themes, but may partake in defining the overall understanding of an image or an image cycle. In the City of God miniatures, Eastern motifs are rarely used to depict a distinct Eastern setting or character. Instead, they mark religious Otherness, spatial distance, negative or at least suspicious behaviour or help to bridge the gap between past and present. Hence, the enrichment of the visual language might be added among the processes active in an age of globalisation, with which this paper started. In order to fully understand how this process operates, that is why one Parisian workshop would produce Orientalised pictures, while another would not; why sometimes stereotypical images were preferred to an entangled visual language and vice versa; or how both visual practices could be used side by side, one must rely on the analysis of a particular art work and its 

31



Peter Burke points out that cultural change takes place “by addition rather than by substitution” (2009, 44).

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circumstances of production. 32 This does not imply that the global is abandoned for the local. On the contrary, the dynamic processes initiated by increasing cultural exchanges only gain sustainability, when they become annexed into the local art production. 33 The visual vocabulary at hand in a certain region or workshop is, therefore, far from static, but subject to dynamic transformations, which are fuelled in times of global encounters. 







Works Cited Primary Sources Augustinus, Aurelius. 1486. La Cité de Dieu, transl. Raoul de Presles. 2 Vols. Abbeville: Jehan Du Pré and Pierre Gérard.

Secondary Sources Akbari, Suzanne Conklin. 2009. Idols in the East: European Representations of Islam and the Orient, 1100-1450. Ithaca, London: Cornell University Press. Appadurai, Arjun. [1996] 2008. Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of Globalisation. 8th ed. Public Worlds 1. Minneapolis, London: University of Minnesota Press. Armitage, David. 2004. Is There a Pre-History of Globalization? In Comparison and History: Europe in Cross-National Perspective, ed. Deborah Cohen and Maura O’Connor, 165-76. New York: Routledge. Baader, Hannah. 2003. Einfluss. In Metzler Lexikon Kunstwissenschaft: Ideen, Methoden, Begriffe, ed. Ulrich Pfister, 73-6. Stuttgart, Weimar: Verlag J. B. Metzler. Bak, János M. 1993. Nikopolis, Schlacht v. In Lexikon des Mittelalters, ed. Norbert Angermann, Robert-Henri Bautier and Robert Auty, Vol. 6: 1191. Munich: Artemis & Winkler Verlag. Barker, John W. 1969. Manuel II Palaeologus (1391-1425): A Study in Late Byzantine Statesmanship. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press. Belting, Hans, and Andrea Buddensieg, eds. 2009. The Global Art World: Audiences, Markets, and Museums. Ostfildern: Hatje Cantz. 32

For the illuminated French manuscripts of the City of God, such a study is currently conducted by the author in the course of the research project Images of Alterity in East and West at Heidelberg University, Germany. 33 For the interdependence of the global and the local, see the helpful remarks of Appadurai [1996] 2008, 1-23, esp. 4-7.

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Birchwood, Matthew, and Matthew Dimmock, eds. 2005. Introduction to Cultural Encounters between East and West, 1453-1699, 1-11. Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Press. Burke, Peter. 2009. Cultural Hybridity. Cambridge: Polity Press. Camille, Michael [1989] 1995. The Gothic Idol: Ideology and Image-Making in Medieval Art. Cambridge new art history and criticism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. —. 1998. The Medieval Art of Love: Objects and Subjects of Desire. London: Laurence King. Clifford, James. 1997. Routes: Travel and Translation in the Late Twentieth Century. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Cutler, Anthony. 2009. Image Making in Byzantium, Sasanian Persia and the Early Muslim World: Images and Cultures. Variorum Collected Studies Series CS 905. Farnham: Ashgate Variorum. Dangler, Jean. 2005. Making Difference in Medieval and Early Modern Iberia. Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press. Delacruz, Elizabeth M. 2009. Introduction to Globalization, Art, and Education, ed. Elizabeth M. Delacruz, Alice Arnold, Michael Parsons and Ann Kuo, 3-27. Reston: National Art Education Association. Dückers, Rob, and Pieter Roelofs, eds. 2005. The Limbourg Brothers: Nijmegen Masters at the French court 1400-1416. Gent, Amsterdam: Ludion. Flood, Finbarr Barry. 2009. Objects of Translation: Material Culture and Medieval “Hindu-Muslim” Encounter. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Gaspar, Camille, and Frédéric Lyna. 1987. Les principaux manuscrits à peintures de la Bibliothèque Royale de Belgique: Réimpression de l’édition originale de 1945 publié par la »Société française de reproductions de manuscrits à peintures, Paris«. Vol. 2. Brussels: Bibliothèque Royale Albert I. Haustein, Lydia. 2008. Global Icons: Globale Bildinszenierung und Kulturelle Identität. Göttingen: Wallstein. Hedeman, Anne D. 2008. Translating the Past: Laurent de Premierfait and Boccaccio’s ‘De Casibus’. Los Angeles: The J. Paul Getty Museum. Jardine, Lisa, and Jerry Brotton. 2000. Global Interests: Renaissance Art between East and West. London: Reaktion Books. Kubiski, Joyce. 2001. Orientalizing Costume in Early Fifteenth-Century French Manuscript Painting (Cité des Dames Master, Limbourg Brothers, Boucicaut Master, Bedford Master). Gesta 40: 161-80. Laborde, Alexandre de. 1909. Les Manuscrits à peintures de la Cité de dieu de Saint Augustin. 3 Vols. Paris: Société des Bibliophiles François.

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Meiss, Millard. 1974. French Painting in the Time of Jean de Berry: The Limbourgs and Their Contemporaries. 2 Vols. London: Thames & Hudson. Miller, Angela. 2008. Beyond the National Self: Cross-Cultural Exchange and Postcolonial Studies. In Schwerpunkt: Bildwissenschaft und Visual Culture Studies in der Diskussion, ed. Norbert Schneider and Andrew Hemingway. Kunst und Politik 10, 39-49. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht Unipress. Morrison, Elizabeth, and Anne D. Hedeman, eds. 2010. Imagining the Past in France: History in Manuscript Painting 1250-1500. Los Angeles: The J. Paul Getty Museum. Naredi-Rainer, Paul von. 1994. Salomos Tempel und das Abendland: Monumentale Folgen historischer Irrtümer. Cologne: DuMont. Nederman, Cary J. 2000. Worlds of Difference: European Discourses of Toleration, c. 1100-c. 1550. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press. Ovadiah, Asher, and Nurith Kennan-Kedar, eds. 1998. East meets West: Art in the Land of Israel. Assaph 3. Tel Aviv: The Yolanda and David Katz Faculty of the Arts, Department of Art History. Sandler, Lucy Freeman. 2010. Rhetorical Strategies in the Pictorial Imagery of Fourteenth-Century Manuscripts: The Case of the Bohun Psalters. In Rhetoric beyond Words: Delight and Persuasion in the Arts of the Middle Ages, ed. Mary Carruthers. Cambridge Studies in Medieval Literature, 96-123. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Saurma-Jeltsch, Lieselotte E. 2010. About the Agency of Things, of Objects and Artefacts. In The Power of Things and the Flow of Cultural Transformations: Art and Culture between Europe and Asia, ed. Lieselotte E. Saurma-Jeltsch and Anja Eisenbeiß. Berlin, Munich: Deutscher Kunstverlag. Saurma-Jeltsch, Lieselotte E., and Anja Eisenbeiß, eds. 2010. The Power of Things and the Flow of Cultural Transformations: Art and Culture between Europe and Asia. Berlin, Munich: Deutscher Kunstverlag. Smith, Sharon Off Dunlap. 1974. Illustrations of Raoul de Praelles’ Translation of St. Augustine’s City of God. 2 Vols. Diss. New York. Smith, Sharon Dunlap. 1982. New Themes for the “City of God” around 1400: The Illustrations of Raoul de Presles’ Translation. Scriptorium 36: 68-82. Snyder, Janet. 2004. Cloth from the Promised Land: Appropriated Islamic Tiraz in Twelth-Century French Sculpture. In Medieval Fabrications: Dress, Textiles, Clothwork, and Other Cultural Imaginings, ed. E. Jane Burns. The New Middle Ages, 147-64. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

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Sterling, Charles 1987-90. La peinture médiévale à Paris: 1300-1500. 2 Vols. Paris: Bibliothèque des Arts. Stillman, Yedida Kalfon. 2000. Arab Dress: A Short History. From the Dawn of Islam to Modern Times. Ed. Norman A. Stillman. 2nd ed. Leiden, Boston, Cologne: Brill. Strickland, Debra Higgs. 2003. Saracens, Demons, & Jews: Making Monsters in Medieval Art. Princeton: Princeton University Press. —. 2008. The Exotic in the Later Middle Ages: Recent Critical Approaches. Literature Compass 5: 58-72. —. 2005. Artists, Audience, and Ambivalence in Marco Polo’s “Divisament dou Monde”. Viator 36: 493-529. Uebel, Michael. 2005. Ecstatic Transformation: On the Uses of Alterity in the Middle Ages. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Villela-Petit, Inès. 2006. Deux visions de la Cité de Dieu: Le Maître de Virgile et le Maître de Boèce. Art de l’enluminure 17: “La Cité de Dieu. Le Maître de Virgile et le Maître de Boèce”: 2-19. Ward, Marvin J. 1984. A Critical Edition of Thomas III, Marquis of Saluzzos’s “Le Livre du Chevalier Errant” (French text). Diss. University of North Carolina.

Internet Sources Cahill, James. 2005. Issues in Sino-Japanese Artistic Exchange. Paper presented at the Sino-Japanese workshop, April 30, Columbia University, New York City. http://jamescahill.info/the-writings-of-james-cahill/cahill-lectures-and-pap ers/69-clp-85-2005.pdf (accessed April 13, 2011). National Library of the Netherlands, and Museum Meermanno. Medieval Illuminated Manuscripts. http://www.kb.nl/manuscripts/ (accessed May 3, 2010).

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Fig. 2-1. Cité des Dames Master, Princes of the East, Thomas of Saluzzo, Le Chevalier Errant, c. 1403-5. Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, Ms. fr. 12559, fol. 162 © Bibliothèque nationale de France.

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Fig. 2-2. Workshop of the Virgil Master, Musical Performance, Saint Augustine, La Cité de Dieu, c. 1410-2. Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, Ms. fr. 6272, fol. 33 © Bibliothèque nationale de France.

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Fig. 2-3. Pagan Idolatry and Courtly Love, Saint Augustine, La Cité de Dieu, c. 1403-5. Boulogne-sur-Mer, Bibliothèque municipale, Ms. 55 (I), fol. 37v © Bibliothèque municipale, Boulogne-sur-Mer.

CHAPTER THREE OTTOMAN MINIATURES AND HUNGARIAN WOODCUTS: A STRATA OF REPRESENTATIONS IN COMMON ANNMARIE PERL

This paper sketches the closest possible correspondence of Ottoman and Hungarian contemporary histories, the ultimate point, beyond national and cultural boundaries, being the existence of a strata of artistic representations in common. The histories of common military conflicts illustrated on the page in Ottoman miniatures and in Hungarian woodcuts and re-enacted in public mock battles in Istanbul and in Hungary are remarkably similar. They render superficial and thus insufficient the stereotypical perspectives of Ottomans viewing the West as decadent and Hungarians viewing the Ottomans as barbarous. Instead, they hint at the profundity of cross-cultural transfer in the early modern period, of Ottoman and Hungarian artists working in each others’ home countries and modes, moving in the main from the periphery to the centre of the Ottoman Empire. In the end, this kind of transfer helps historically account for the homogeneous Ottoman artistic style and the “original” Ottoman genre of historiography that emerge out of the diversity of the Ottoman Empire in the sixteenth century (Atil 1973, 15). More than an original invention, it will be argued, these are products of a cosmopolitan attitude and reality. The major difficulty in studying this problem owes itself to the basic political difference between the Ottoman Empire and the Hungarian kingdom, which became a vassal state in 1526 (Battle of Mohács) and then an Ottoman province in 1541 (Siege of Buda). Until the end of the seventeenth century, the Ottoman Empire was expanding in Europe, Asia and Africa whereas Hungary was broken up, in varying areas Ottoman, Habsburg and independent. The asymmetry in the relationship between the dominant Ottoman Empire and vastly subdominant Hungary means that the former was in the position to disproportionately affect the latter—as it did. Consequently, on the Hungarian side, there is a veritable body of works

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studying the effects of the Turkish occupation on the arts (in architecture, textiles, costumes, ceramics, metalwork and painting) whereas, from the Ottoman perspective, there is one article by Gülru Necipo÷lu, entitled “Süleyman the Magnificent and the Representation of Power in the Context of Ottoman-Hapsburg-Papal Rivalry” (Necipo÷lu 1989, 401-27) and one monograph by Géza Fehér, entitled Turkish Miniatures from the Period of Hungary’s Turkish Occupation. The other related difficulty in studying this problem is that Ottoman influence in Hungary is easier to detect than Hungarian influence in the Ottoman Empire for the reason that Hungary’s “culture” was essentially Matthias Corvinus’s imports from Renaissance Italy, while Ottoman culture was by nature diverse (Timurid 1 , Seljuk, Byzantine, Persian, Arabic 2 ) and had long-established trade contacts with Europe, including Italy. 3 It is more difficult, in sum, to find the Hungarian in the Ottoman and thus the Ottoman perspective on Hungary, which is the present aim, than vice versa. Altogether Necipo÷lu assigns Hungary much importance in the development of the Ottoman preoccupation with Western emblems of sovereignty. Firstly, the sultan’s crescent was adopted only after the conquest of Hungary in 1526. 4 Secondly, in an elaborate ceremony, which took place in Hungary in 1529, Süleyman crowned his vassal, János Zapolya, with the Holy Crown of Saint Stephen, after which the sultan began to use the title “Distributor of Crowns to the Monarchs of the World” in his correspondence with European rulers (Necipo÷lu 1989, 416). 5 Thirdly, three bronze statues, probably of Hercules, Diana and Apollo, were taken as trophies from King Matthias Corvinus’s castle in Buda and erected on a group of antique columns in front of the palace of Ibrahim Pasha, 

















1



Fehér writes, “The Ottoman Turkish fine arts are most indebted—perhaps even for their very existence—to the influence of fourteenth and fifteenth century Timurid painting of Central Asia, an influence still decisive even in the late phase of Ottoman miniature painting.” Fehér 1978, 9. 2 “In Asia Minor, where the Ottoman arts were born, two highly developed cultures, the Seljuk and the Byzantine, were to be found, while Persian and Arabic cultures were more distant influences.” Hegyi and Zimányi 1989, 98. 3 Pál Engel writes that Hungary conveys the impression of being an illiterate, prehistoric society. See Thuróczy 1991, 12. 4 According to a contemporary observer, Luigi Bassano, “Questa è honorata da ciaschuno per essere impresa del Signor loro.” Quoted in Necipo÷lu 1989, 412, fn. 46. Quoted from Bassano, Costumi, et i modi particolari de la vita de' Turchi (Rome: Antonio Blado, 1545). Republished facsimile edited by F. Babinger, Munich, 1963. 5 Rhoads Murphey discusses the significance of this ritual act of submission and other ceremonial acts. Murphey 2001, 197-221.

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Süleyman’s grand vizier, at the Hippodrome in Istanbul; immediately after Ibrahim’s execution in 1536—coincidently enough as punishment for hubris—these idols were destroyed by a conservative, religious crowd (Necipo÷lu 1989, 419). Following Necipo÷lu’s lead, this paper also considers the prestige value of conquering Hungary for the Ottoman Empire. Despite the prohibition of figuration by theologians in the ninth century, there is a long tradition of illustrated court histories in the Islamic world, an influential example being the painted one created by the Mamluk-era historian Makrizi of the Fatimid dynasty (Fehér 1978, 10). As in Mamluk Egypt, in Ottoman Turkey, painting was reserved for the walls of palaces or the pages of manuscripts, exclusive spaces for which the most talented painters were recruited, Makrizi inviting his painters from Central Asia and the Ottoman sultans from Persia and other conquered lands. It was a figurative art for private, imperial consumption, completely opposed, for example, to the dominant Ottoman art of mosque architecture, built for religious and popular use. 6 The arts of the book in the Islamic world were everywhere a court affair, since also the costs of engaging poets, calligraphers, illuminators, miniaturists and bookbinders were exorbitant; but, in the Ottoman world, unlike elsewhere, production was under the rigid control of the sultan: an author from the court school was chosen to write on a given theme, and after the draft was approved, calligraphers and miniaturists submitted samples of work, the best of whom were chosen to execute the book (Atil 1973, 11). The Ottoman sultans so attentively put this Islamic tradition to personal use, because it was the means by which they recorded their military achievements for posterity. After the conquest of Istanbul, Mehmed II (“the Conqueror”) established an imperial painting studio, the nakkaúhane, which produced the first examples of Ottoman miniatures, previous manuscripts having been illustrated by Persian miniatures (Meredith-Owens 1963, 11-12). In the 1550s, Süleyman (“the Magnificent”) created the office of the úehnameci, the official court historiographer, also in emulation of a Persian model, Firdawsi’s Shahnama (Book of Kings) (Woodhead 1983, 1). 7 Couched in traditional Islamic terms, commissioned by the sultan through the state apparatus, Ottoman miniatures thus provide a useful 





6



As Esin Atil writes, “Illustrated manuscripts were zealously guarded in the palace libraries throughout Ottoman history and only a meager amount were given as presents, captured during battles or as in the past century sold or taken from the imperial collections.” Atil 1973, 11. 7 Fehér writes that the office of the úehnameci was established by Mehmed II. Fehér 1978, 10.

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counterpoint to Necipo÷lu’s study of the Ottoman preoccupation with Western emblems of sovereignty, with respect to Hungary, the crescent, the crown and statuary, manipulated in order to communicate with Western audiences on their own terms. These histories are Islamic sites of power play: both treasured emblems of sovereignty and material records of that sovereignty, most gloriously represented by supremacy over powerful others, in other words, rather two strong groups in close combat than one strong group destroying another weak one. For the reason that Hungary, as Stanford Shaw has put it, is “the great landmark of Ottoman penetration of Europe”, or, alternatively, the sometime battlefield and otherwise buffer zone of the Ottoman-Hapsburg rivalry, it features very prominently in Ottoman miniatures (Shaw 1976, 217). 8 Though, indeed, the stakes quickly became cosmic (and Crusadian), since these histories offered proof of extraordinary events, the textual and visual interest was in accuracy as a guarantee of truth, as a means of enhancing credibility. There was the expectation of producing something authentic and proud but not bombastic. 9 The sultan’s historiographers (for examples, Celâlzade Mustafa, Lütfi Pasha, Ibrahim Peçevi) thus used archival materials, documented actual settings and personages and some even joined campaigns to bring back first-hand reports (Meredith-Owens 1963, 13). Miniaturists, drawn from all over the Empire, including Hungary, often depicted their home countries, even imagining internal political situations, in which Ottomans were not present. 10 In 1527-8, entries in the archives name twenty-nine painters, fourteen of whom were Turks, the rest being Persians, Albanians, Circassians and Moldovans, with twelve apprentices attached to the court (And 1978, 27). In 1557, the archives name thirty-five painters, twenty-six of whom were Turks while nine were non-Turks, mainly Persians, but also a 







8





On the buffer zone, see Murphey 2001, 202, 208. Christine Woodhead writes on Ta’liki-zade's ùehname-i Kmayun, “Muslim victory is not portrayed as inevitable- the narrative opens with the defeats of the governor of Bosnia at Sissek and of the governor of Buda at Istolni-Belgrad ... By implication, it is chiefly through the experienced generalship of Sinan Pasa that success is achieved in 1594—it is a triumph of will over odds. If this example is followed by future generals, Ottoman military strength should be maintained. The sehname is thus an exemplary work, which reinforces the military self-image of the Ottoman state. It is a story of excitement and daring.” Woodhead 1983, 94-5. 10 For example, a miniature depicting Louis II, upon hearing the news of Süleyman’s approach, holding a war council in the vicinity of Mohács in 1526, in Fethullah Arif Çelebi (Arifi)’s Süleymannâme (1558), p. 200a, Topkapi Saray Museum, Istanbul. Fehér writes that “this splendid representation of Louis II’s war council may have been created by a Hungarian master active in the court workshop of the sultan.” Fehér 1978, Plate X. 9

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European and a Hungarian (Ettinghausen 1965, 15). An account book dating from 1557-8 lists the names of Turkish and Persian artists and those of Western masters and their assistants separately (Fehér 1978, 17). Among the Western artists, “Djafer-i Madjar” (Ca‘fer-i Macar), “Ali Madjar” and “Pervane-i Madjar”, or the Magyars Djafer, Ali and Pervane worked as painters while “Hüseyn-i Üngürüs” or the Hungarian Hüseyin worked as an assistant to master Hasan Çelebi (Ibid.). Fehér writes that the major part of all the miniatures depicting incidents of Hungarian history can be assigned to Hungarian artists (Ibid.). Certainly, it is reasonable to assume that, having recruited Hungarian artists and given accuracy as a main objective, the Ottoman sultans would employ Hungarian artists to articulate the imperial perspective of history. Scholars widely date the emergence of the homogeneous Ottoman artistic style and the genre of historiography in miniature painting to 1520 with the creation of the Selimnâme (1521-4), which narrates the life of Sultan Selim I, since it contains Ottoman costumes and contemporary events such as battle scenes. 11 At the same time, the emergence of this new style and genre is most often explained by the influence of cartography, exemplified by the world map of the Ottoman admiral Piri Reis, created in 1513 (Ettinghausen 1965, 15). 12 The influence of cartography accounts for a limited number of Ottoman miniatures of this period that depict characteristic geography. However, a far more significant and representative number of historiographical Ottoman miniatures, while sharing the global perspective and the attention to accuracy of Piri Reis’s maps, seem to derive these qualities and to altogether stem from other, more mundane sources. On the whole, they are interested in the human elements: in meetings, actual or imaginary, of rulers and in battle scenes. Since these miniatures were often created in the imperial workshop in Istanbul, far away in space and time from the illustrated events, it is probable that, like the court historiographers, besides relying on personal origin or experience, the artists made use of the sultan’s library, where their miniatures too would ultimately be stored. Of course, 1520 also marks the start of Süleyman’s long reign and first campaigns into the Danube valley toward Hungary, taking Belgrade in 1521, Mohács on 19 August 1526 and Buda just ten days later (Labib 1979, 444). Since it culminates in a stereotypical expression of iconoclasm, the story of the bronze statues taken from Matthias Corvinus’s castle in Buda is 





11



For example, see G.M. Meredith-Owens 1963, 15. The famous map, a rather recent discovery of 1929, has served as evidence for many other innovations and claims, more or less convincingly. For a critical analysis, see McIntosh 2000. 12

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noteworthy, but more precious war booty was taken from Buda to Istanbul: the library of Matthias Corvinus, one of the Renaissance king’s most important achievements and one of the finest libraries in Europe. As the only “contemporary ‘synthesis’” of Hungarian history of the preceding 100 years, 13 János Thuróczy’s Chronicle of the Hungarians (1488) was among these books 14 and, if it did not arrive thus, would have made its way to the Ottomans otherwise, as it did around much of Europe in many editions. It was a medieval-type chronicle with the contemporary objective of arguing for the necessity and usefulness of the Turkish wars. Although Thuróczy’s Chronicle is incomparable in technical achievement to the Ottoman court histories, being composed by a layman, not a professional historian, being mass produced, not written by a calligrapher, being illustrated by often repeated woodcuts coloured by hand, not individually created miniatures, it or other texts of like ilk could very well have served as a sourcebook for Ottoman miniaturists even of Hungarian origin. By the latter half of the sixteenth century, Ottoman miniatures had reached the apex of their development. Osman’s compositions epitomize this height, often considered among the finest in the tradition. Although the legendary Osman has been credited with far more compositions than he could or would have produced, 15 a document mentions that Osman is largely responsible for the miniatures of the first volume of the Hünernâme, composed by Seyyid Loqman in 1579 during the reign of Murad III (Fehér 1978, 21). Two particularly fine examples can be attributed to him and are of interest here, depicting the Battle of Nicopolis (1396) and an imaginary scene in which Sultan Murad II (1421-1451) slashes the helmet (and the head) of János Hunyadi (1407?-1456), the great Hungarian hero and father of Matthias Corvinus (Figs. 3-1 & 3-2). Both events, historical and fictive, took place about a century and a half before the composition of the miniatures (Fehér 1978, 21). Osman’s compositions are thus not first-hand accounts but rather rely on an established code of representations. They negotiate tents and castles, white turbans and coloured hats, surface-patterned and block-coloured, caftans and armour, with the facility in design of a deeply inherited—not a newly invented—vocabulary. Thuróczy’s Chronicle could reasonably have served Osman or his 









13



This is the assessment of Vardy 1994, 574. For the virtual reconstruction of Corvinus’ library, a major scholarly contribution, see István Monok, ed., Bibliotheca Corviniana Digitalis, National Széchényi Library, http://www.corvina.oszk.hu/. 15 In the workshop system in place, masters drew compositions, which apprentices then completed. For more on the master-apprentice working dynamic, see Kerametli 1985. 14

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predecessors as an archival visual source for the reason that it was closer to the historical events. Thuróczy’s Chronicle shows Hunyadi, 16 whose appearance the miniaturists undoubtedly sought to approximate if not replicate (Fig. 3-3), and also literal and figurative battle scenes between men and architecture, respectively (Figs. 3-4 & 3-5). Although the creation of some symbolic shorthand of binaries seems like it would be obvious enough to artists of both sides when faced with certain visual differences (for one, Ottoman military encampment versus European-style architecture), the manipulation of these binaries by amplification in scale or reversal shows that, more than observations, they are deliberately engaged and current symbols. For example, the special meaning of the Battle of Nicopolis (the decisive Ottoman victory) is expressed by the fact that the men and architecture are mismatched, the Ottomans occupying the fortress and the Hungarian and other Christian forces attacking it from encampments behind the river. Between the woodcuts of Thuróczy’s Chronicle and Osman’s miniatures a century later, there is a common rhetorical vocabulary far exceeding the empirical. A pair of coincident miniatures, depicting Temesvár and rendered in 1558, demonstrates an earlier point in the development of Ottoman miniatures (Figs. 3-6 & 3-7). The first miniature is part of an extraordinary volume, the Süleymannâme of Fethullah Arif Çelebi (or Arifi), covering the reign of Süleyman up to the present moment in a mixture of Ottoman and Western elements (Fig. 3-6). Also in Persian (not yet in more accessible Ottoman Turkish) but much more modest is a volume entitled Fütühat-I Camila focusing on Süleyman’s 1551-2 military campaign (Fig. 3-7). The author is unknown but the calligrapher, Abu Turab al-Hasanı bin Hobi aú-ùirazi, wrote that he copied the volume in Istanbul in 1558 (Fehér 1978, 18). Although, as Fehér writes, the miniatures of the second volume were highly influenced by the first, even containing identical inscriptions, the depictions of Temesvár are significantly different: the first is a realistic representation of a city by a Western master who knew Temesvár well, while the second is a characteristic rendering, operating in the cartographic type of miniature painting pioneered by Matrakçı Nasûh (Fehér 1978, 18). 17 While the depictions of the city in the background strongly contrast, the events of the foreground are identical in composition. Clearly, when given the option, the miniaturist of Fütühat-I Camila chose not to copy the 







16 No contemporary representation of János Hunyadi survives. Tanner 2008, Plate 2, Image 3, caption. 17 See Fehér 1978, Plates XXXIVA-B, XXXV. The translations of the inscriptions in Figures 3-6, 3-7 and 3-8 are quoted from Fehér’s translations in these plates and from Plate XXIII.

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Western representation of Temesvár, opting instead to emulate Nasûh. Nasûh was an exceptional figure, a chronicler of mathematical and historical writings and an arms bearer to Süleyman on his military campaigns in Hungary (Atil 1973, 15). Also an artist, he illustrated (or oversaw the illustration of) his own chronicles, including the Süleymannâme, a five-volume work, covering the period 1520-51 and including the 1543 campaign that culminated in the capture of Székesfehérvár (Fig. 3-8). Nasûh is known for introducing a new style of miniature painting that drew on the contemporary discoveries of Piri Reis (Fehér 1978, 15). Nasûh’s style is indeed new; however, the source of his innovation lies elsewhere as does his interest in accuracy, namely, in his first-hand military experience on the battlefield. On a short-hand, Persian-patterned landscape, he writes notes and paints symbols, situating villages and garrisons in a relative geography within the military campaign. The excitement of the viewer does not stem from dramatic narrative content— there are no figures in Nasûh’s images—but rather from the proximity to the narrator’s testimonial in a series of close-range annotated military maps, precisely and dynamically documenting the campaign from an insider’s point of view. Nasûh not only created court histories for the private pleasure of the sultan but also mock sieges of cardboard and wooden Hungarian castles on wheels for public entertainment as part of the twenty days’ circumcision festivities for Süleyman’s sons, held in the Hippodrome in Istanbul in 1530 (Rogers and Ward 1988, 28). 18 These mock sieges would be engrained tradition by the time of the fifteen days’ and nights’ circumcision festivities arranged for Sultan Ahmet III’s four sons in 1720. 19 Nearly 200 years after Nasûh’s creation, no less than eight miniatures of the Surname-I Vehbi, in which the poet Vehbi and the painter Levni represent the festival, contain images of medieval castles of various sizes (smaller than a figure to four times taller than a figure) on wheels, spouting cannons and being set on fire (Fig. 3-9). 20 It has been suggested that the Ottoman enthusiasm for mock sieges and thus Nasûh’s work can be traced back to the Mamluk tradition of mock sieges and military reviews (Rogers and Ward 1988, 43, fn, 101-2). While it is true that the Ottomans and the Mamluks share much in common in the way of public ceremonial, the Friday procession to the mosque being a ritual also for the Fatamids, certainly the architectural centrepiece but 







18





The model fortresses of Matrakçi Nasûh are depicted in his book, Tuhfat al-Ghuzat (1532) at the Esad Efendi, Süleymaniye Library. 19 The festival would be the last Ottoman celebration of this magnitude. See Ömer Koç’s forward in Atil 1999, 9. 20 These miniatures are reproduced in Atil 1969, Plates 2, 21, 23, 35, 40, 44, 45 (155b-116).

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perhaps also the idea of the dramatic mock battles comes additionally from elsewhere. At the Metropolitan Museum of Art, a Hungarian-style shield from the first half of the sixteenth century is an artefact of a “Hungarian-style” tournament (Fig. 3-10) (Metropolitan Museum of Art 2006). 21 In these public mock battles, costumed warriors would use sabres to strike off feathers attached to their opponents’ helmets and shields. The conserved shield carries the double-blazed sword of the Prophet Muhammad on its exterior and the Crucifix and instruments of the Passion on the interior, the iconography indicating that it was part of the costume of a Christian dressed as an Ottoman warrior. Shields like this one were not just simple stage props but rather treasured relics, even trophies. The Hungarian-style shields, distinguished by an upswept tip, had first served the hussars, the Hungarian cavalry, until, in the early sixteenth century, whole arsenals of them seem to have been captured by the Turks, who painted Islamic symbols over the original emblems (Nickel 1991, 54-5). By the time that the Hungarians recaptured these shields, Western fighting styles had changed (Nickel 1991, 55). The shields thus ultimately functioned as ideological weapons, much like the woodcuts of Thuróczy’s Chronicle, in visually rich and materially specific re-enactments of history. Although Nasûh might not have witnessed these dramatic mock battles himself, the Hungarian painters working in his workshop surely would have. Hungary was, during Nasûh’s time, and would, in retrospect, forever be the farthest reach of the Ottoman Empire into Europe. Indeed, at the circumcision festivities of 1530, the year after an impetuous Süleyman had been humiliated in the Siege of Vienna, the sultan would have sought to remind the public of Hungary and the previous years, namely, the momentum of the Ottoman army that it represented. On the page or in public, spectacularizing the history of the Ottoman defeat of the Hungarians justified the sultans’ claim to power, re-enacting the reasons for the dynasty’s existence and its accomplishments. 

21



The following information about this object and its use was obtained from the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s online article, “Hungarian-style Shield [Eastern European] (49.57.1)”, Timeline of Art History, New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000–. http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/ho/08/eue/ho_49.57.1.htm (October 2006). There are two comparable objects: the first is in the Arms & Armour Collections of the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna; and the second is in the Esterhazy Collections at Forchtenstein Castle in Austria. For this information and for images of the object, I am grateful to Dirk Breiding of the Arms and Armor Department of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

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Works Cited Primary Sources Efendí, Evliyá. 1968. Narrative of Travels in Europe, Asia, and Africa, in the Seventeenth Century. Trans. Joseph von Hammer. New York: Johnson Reprint. 7KXUyczy, -inos. 1488. Chronica Hungarorum. Augsburg: Erhard Ratdolt, for Theobald Feger. National Széchényi Library, Budapest, Rare Books Department, Inc. 1143. István Monok, ed. Bibliotheca Corviniana Digitalis. National Széchényi Library. http://www.corvina.oszk.hu/. —. 1488. Chronica Hungarorum. Brünn: Conrad Stahel and Mathias Preunlein, 20 March 1488. New York Public Library, New York City, Spencer Collection. —. 1978. A Magyarok Krónikája (Chronicle of the Hungarians), Vol. 2. Facsimile of the original manuscript. Budapest: Magyar Helikon. —. 1991. Chronicle of the Hungarians. Trans. Frank Mantello. Bloomington, Ind.: Indiana University, Research Institute for Inner Asian Studies.

Secondary Sources And, Metin. 1972. Turklerde dekor Sanative Dramatic savas Gosterileri. Turkiyemiz 7: 12-9. —. 1978. Turkish Miniature Painting. Ankara: Dost Yayinlari. Atil, Esin. 1969. Surname-I Vehbi: An Eighteenth Century Ottoman Book. Ann Arbor: University Microfilms. —. 1973. Exhibition Catalogue of Turkish Art of the Ottoman Period. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution. —. 1999. Levni and the Surname: The Story of an Eighteenth-Century Ottoman Festival. Istanbul: Koçbank. Bayerle, Gustav. 1972. Ottoman Diplomacy in Hungary: Letters from the Pashas of Buda, 1590-1593. Bloomington: Indiana UP. Ça÷man, Filiz and Zeren Tanindi. 1986. The Topkapi Saray Museum. Trans., exp. and ed. J.M. Rogers. London: Thames and Hudson. David, Géza and Pál Fodor, ed. 1994. Hungarian-Ottoman Military and Diplomatic Relations in the Age of Süleyman the Magnificent. Budapest: Hungarian Academy of Sciences. Deák, István. 1992. Hungary. The American Historical Review 97, 4: 1041-63. Edel, Kathryn A. 2008. Representations of the Frontier in Ottoman Town

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Views of the Sixteenth Century. Imago Mundi 60, 1: 1-22. Esin, Emel. 1960. Turkish Miniature Painting. Rutland, Vermont: Charles E. Tuttle Company. Ettinghausen, Richard. 1965. Turkish Miniatures: From the Thirteenth to the Eighteenth Century. New York: United Nations. Fehér, Géza. 1978. Turkish Miniatures from the Period of Hungary’s Turkish Occupation. Trans. Lili Halápi. Budapest: Corvina Press. Fehérvári, Géza. 1982. A Major Study on Ottoman Architecture in Hungary. Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 45, 1: 67-73. Fisher, Allan and Carol Garret Fisher. 1985. A Note on the Location of Royal Ottoman Ateliers. Muqarnas 3: 118-20. Galavics, Géza. 1986. Kössünk Kardot az Pogány Ellen: Török Háborúk és KépzĘmĦvészet. Budapest: KépzĘmĦvészeti Kiadó. Gerelyes, Ibolya. 2004. Seeking the East in the West: The Zsolnay Phenomenon. Muqarnas 21: 139-51. Gerö, Gyözö. 1997. Monuments Turcs. In Corpus d’Archéologie Ottomane, ed. Abdeljelil Temimi, 67-8. Zaghouan: L’Institut National du Patrimoine. Gervers, Veronika. 1982. The Influence of Ottoman Turkish Textiles and Costume in Eastern Europe with Particular Reference to Hungary. Toronto: Royal Ontario Museum. Grabar, Oleg. 1989. An Exhibition of High Ottoman Art. Muqarnas 6: 1-11. Hegyi, Klára and Vera Zimányi. 1989. The Ottoman Empire in Europe. Budapest: Corvina. Kerametli, Can. 1985. Turkish Miniatures of the Sixteenth Century. Antika, The Turkish Journal of Collectable Art 4: 7. Kortepeter, Carl Max. 1972. Ottoman Imperialism during the Reformation: Europe and the Caucasus. New York: NYU Press. Labib, Subhi. 1979. The Era of Süleyman the Magnificent: Crisis of Orientation. International Journal Middle East Studies 10, 4: 435-51. Lewis, Bernard. 1982. The Muslim discovery of Europe. New York: W.W. Norton & Company. McIntosh, Gregory C. 2000. The Piri Reis Map of 1513. Athens, Georgia: University of Georgia Press. Meredith-Owens, G.M. 1963. Turkish Miniatures. London: British Museum. Miller, W. 1901. Europe and the Ottoman Power before the Nineteenth Century. The English Historical Review 16, 63: 452-71. Murphey, Rhoads. 2001. Süleyman I and the Conquest of Hungary: Ottoman Manifest Destiny or a Delayed Reaction to Charles V’s

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Universalist Vision. Journal of Early Modern History 5, 3: 197-221. Necipo÷lu, Gülru. 1989. Süleyman the Magnificent and the Representation of Power in the Context of Ottoman-Hapsburg-Papal Rivalry. The Art Bulletin 71, 3: 401-27. —. 1991. Architecture, Ceremonial, and Power: The Topkapi Palace in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries. Cambridge: MIT Press. —. 2005. The Age of Sinan: Architectural Culture in the Ottoman Empire. London: Reaktion Books. Nickel, Helmut. 1991. Arms and Armor: From the Permanent Collection. The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 49, 1: 1, 4, 9-64. Perjés, Géza. 1989. The Fall of the Medieval Kingdom of Hungary: Mohács 1526-Buda 1541. Trans. Márió D. FenyĘ. Highland Lakes, NJ: Atlantic Research and Publications. Renda, Günsel. 2005. The Ottoman Empire and Europe: Cultural Encounters. In Cultural Contacts in Building a Universal Civilization: Islamic Contributions, ed. Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, 277-303. Istanbul: IRCICA. Rogers, J.M. and R.M. Ward. Süleyman the Magnificent. London: British Museum, 1988. Shaw, Stanford. 1976. History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey. Vol. 1, Empire of the Gazis: The Rise and Decline of the Ottoman Empire, 1280-1808. New York: Cambridge University Press. Stchoukine, Ivan. 1966. La Peinture Turque d’après les Manuscrits Illustres, 1ere Partie: de Sulayman 1er a Osman II, 1520-1622. Paris: Librairie Orientaliste Paul Geuthner. Tanner, Marcus. 2008. The Raven King: Matthias Corvinus and the Fate of His Lost Library. New Haven: Yale University Press. Vardy, Steven Bela. 1994. Review of Chronicle of the Hungarians, by János Thuróczy, Frank Mantello, Pál Engel, Speculum 69, 2: 574. Woodhead, Christine. 1983. Ta’liki-zade's ùehname-i +mayun: A History of the Ottoman Campaign into Hungary, 1593-94. Berlin: K. Schwarz.

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Fig. 3-1. Osman, Nicopolis, 1396. Miniature in Seyyid Loqman, Hünernâme (1579), Vol. 1. Topkapi Palace Museum, Istanbul, Inv. No. H. 1523-108b.

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Fig. 3-2. Osman, Sultan Murad sits on his Throne, having just slashed asunder János Hunyadi’s Helmet. Miniature in Seyyid Loqman, Hünernâme (1579), Vol. 1. Topkapi Palace Museum, Istanbul, Inv. No. H. 1523-143b.

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Fig. 3-3. János Hunyadi. Woodcut in János Thuróczy, Chronica Hungarorum (1488) (Brünn edition). Spencer Collection, The New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations.

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Fig. 3-4. Literal Battle Scene. Woodcut in János Thuróczy, Chronica Hungarorum (1488) (Augsburg edition). National Széchényi Library, Budapest, Rare Books Department, Inc. 1143.

Fig. 3-5. Figurative Battle Scene. Woodcut in János Thuróczy, Chronica Hungarorum (1488) (Augsburg edition). National Széchényi Library, Budapest, Rare Books Department, Inc. 1143.

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Fig. 3-6. The Persian inscription reads: “A stone [cannon-ball] was set loose and with thunder and lightning turned the earth into a sea of blood. It hit the head of the commander’s horse, which by this blow was torn asunder.” Miniature in Fethullah Arif Çelebi (Arifi), Süleymannâme (1558). Topkapi Palace Museum, Istanbul, Inv. No. H. 1517-533a.

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Fig. 3-7. The Persian inscription reads: “The horse collapsed beneath the commander and bathed the earth in blood.” Miniature in unknown author, Fütühat-I Camila (1558). Topkapi Saray Museum, Istanbul, Inv. No. H. 1592-19a.

Ottoman Miniatures and Hungarian Woodcuts

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Fig. 3-8. Matrakçı Nasûh, inscription reads: “On this side of the village of Kestöh [Kesztölc, near Bátaszék], on July 13, four miles. Opposite to it Seksar [Szekszárd], on July 14, two miles and a half. The castle of Tona [Tolna], on July 15, two miles.” Miniature in Matrakçı Nasûh, Süleymannâme (1551) at the earliest. Topkapi Palace Museum, Istanbul, Inv. No. H. H.1608-87b.

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Fig. 3-9. Levni, Performances of the Topcu Corps, 1720. Miniature in Vehbi, Surname-I Vehbi (1729-30). Topkapi Palace Museum, Istanbul, Inv. No. A.3593-47a.

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Fig. 3-10. Hungarian-Style Shield (exterior view), c. 1500-50. Wood, leather, gesso, polychromy. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Rogers Fund, 1949 (49.57.1). Image © The Metropolitan Museum of Art. .

PART II ANGLO-JAPANESE CULTURAL EXCHANGES IN MUSEUM PRACTICE AND ART MAKING

CHAPTER FOUR THE ART OF COPYING: REPRODUCTIONS OF JAPANESE MASTERPIECES IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM PRINCESS AKIKO OF MIKASA

The words “reproduction” or “copy” can have a somewhat negative connotation. Today, we do not consider reproductions as works of art, as they are not “originals”. However, making copies has always played an important part in the history of artistic production, to mention only Romans producing copies of Greek sculptures and Impressionist painters copying Japanese ukiyo-e prints. The reproduction was, in fact, one of the main categories of objects eagerly collected by Western museums from the nineteenth to the early twentieth century. This paper aims to examine the role of reproductions of Japanese works in the collection of the British Museum. The British Museum acquired a number of reproductions of Japanese artworks in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, for example, copies of Sutton Hoo objects in 1939, and of a monumental brass-plate in 1909. As well as European works, the Museum acquired many Asian works under the leadership of Laurence Binyon (1869-1943), Keeper of the Sub-Department of Oriental Prints and Drawings. A reproduction of the famous Satake version scroll of the Thirty-six Immortal Poets π۸‫ءێ‬Կ Լքዚ‫ט‬㽇㬍ρʳ was presented by Dan Takuma ቸྲᗣʳ (1858-1932) in 1923 and the Admonitions of the Instructress of the Ladies in the Palace π Ֆ‫׾‬ᒥ㤾㬍ρʳ was purchased by the Museum with enthusiastic support of Binyon in 1903. It is thought to be a Tang-dynasty copy of a work by Gu Kaizhi ᥽ჱհ (344?-405?), a painter of the Eastern Jin period (317-420). Even though a copy, this scroll is now considered to be one of the masterpieces of Chinese painting. In China especially, copying was respected as a standard method of producing a painting. For example, the Six Dynasties painter Xie He ᝔᎒ (dates unknown) listed “transmission by copying” as one of the six principles of painting in his Old Record of the

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77

Classification of Painters ό‫ײ‬㪃঴䐇ύ. 1 Such China’s artistic tradition to respect copy and reproduction gave the Admonitions handscroll high status in Chinese art. Thus, copying classical works or a master’s works was a fundamental element of executing artworks, both in the East and West (Matsuura 2005, 7). The question arises here is why the British Museum acquired so many reproductions. If we are to consider what reproduction meant in Europe in the late nineteenth century, a good example to examine is the Cast Courts in the Victoria and Albert Museum, which comprises of two large halls dedicated to reproductions. Originally called the Architectural Courts, they were opened in 1873, and their display consists of reproductions or plaster casts of Classical and Renaissance sculptures. Reproduction or plaster cast collecting reached its peak of popularity in the mid to late nineteenth century. Henry Cole (1808-1882), the first director of the South Kensington Museum (now Victoria and Albert Museum), believed there to be educational benefits in casts and was largely responsible for their acquisition. At the Paris Exposition in 1867, Cole encouraged fifteen European Crown Princes to sign up to an agreement to exchange casts between European institutions (Williamson 1996, 184). Many works were brought, commissioned or purchased from particular workshops across Europe. The Cast Courts began by displaying originals and reproductions together, to “show the student how great masters have decorated architecture with sculpture” (Ibid.). As the original purpose of the Cast Courts makes clear, casts were collected for educational and training purposes for art students. Susan Pearce points out that casts were recognised as copies, but at the same time they were accorded the same kind of prestige as genuine classical antiquities (Pearce 1995, 363). In the nineteenth century, casts or reproductions had a “fine art” status, and museums had a role to play as drawing schools. William Richard Hamilton, an attaché to Lord Elgin’s embassy, answered the question “Are the originals not preferable for study?” as follows: 



I believe not, with regard to broken fragments and others, likewise, I should presume that casts are preferable to the originals, because they cast a purer 1

Old Record of the Classification of Painters is the oldest discourse of painting in China, compiled by Xie He. He commented twenty-seven then leading painters and classified them into six ranks through six principles of painting as criteria. These were “spirit resonance”, “bone method”, “correspondence to the object”, “suitability to type”, “division and planning”, and “transmission by copying”. These principles were regarded as canons of the execution of painting by successive generations.

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Chapter Four and a more direct shadow, whereas in a fragment of ancient sculpture you can hardly distinguish the dirt, as it were, from the shadow (Jenkins 1992, 34).

In other words, reproductions have sometimes been regarded as superior to the originals. Also, they allowed students to study in their own country masterpieces of Greek, Roman and Renaissance sculptures from other European countries which they would never travel. Thus, in the nineteenth century, many museums collected reproductions to provide study materials for students. 2 This approach was sustained by Western concepts of a canon of high quality sculptures and paintings. Reproductions were, therefore, regarded as necessary to substitute for unique pieces. In the nineteenth century, many museums purchased or even made reproductions of masterpieces to fill gaps of the collections. It is necessary to consider why the British Museum was able to acquire numbers of reproductions of Japanese masterpieces. What was the significance of copying and reproductions in late nineteenth- to early twentieth-century Japan? From ancient time, Japan regarded Chinese culture as an example of a major part of the canon, and many Chinese traditions were introduced to Japan. Painters of the Kano School especially regarded very highly of copying. Pupils had to copy model books repeatedly to master traditional patterns, styles and techniques (Tokyo National Museum 2005, 25). Until the Edo period (1603-1868), such copying tradition was just a learning process of producing artworks. However, from the Meiji era (1868-1912), Japanese people started to apply this tradition to another aspect; to preserve old artworks. An important point to note is that copying in nineteenth century Japan had two aims: the first was to preserve past methods and styles and thereby preserve old masterpieces; the second objective was to teach students and to encourage them to create new works based upon this knowledge (Weston 2003, 175). These actions to preserve artworks were initiated and driven by the government. In Meiji-era Japan, this entailed three stages: the first priority was to preserve the original work; the second was to make copies (sketches and photographs) as a record; and the third was to make reproductions, in case of accidents or the immovability of the original from temple or shrine (Satǀ 2005, 21). The first aim was covered by legal 

2



During the twentieth century, the cast collections steadily lost their position, and by the 1970s they had lapsed into the spurious masterpiece class. See Pearce 1995, 363-4.

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79

provisions, 3 and the second and third were catered for by the governmental surveys of temples and shrines and by museums. 4 It is the third aim that provides a clue to understand the significance of reproductions in the early stages of modern Japan. Through these governmental aims, many reproductions were produced in Meiji-era Japan. The British Museum collected Japanese artworks in order to show the full sweep of Japanese art history through their collections. However, after the constitution of Koshaji hozon hǀ in 1897 (Meiji 30), most good artworks of the kind the British Museum sought, came under the protection of the Japanese government and were difficult to export. This situation was reinforced by another law, the Kokuhǀ hozon hǀ, in 1929 (Showa 4) and Jnjyǀ bijutsuhin tǀ no hozon ni kansuru hǀritsu in 1933 (Showa 8). At the same time, Western interest in reproductions encouraged the Japanese to value copying artworks. They began to realise that reproductions could play an essential role in the fields of education and conservation. From that time the Japanese began to distribute reproductions of Japanese masterpieces to Western countries, alongside publications on Japanese art. The original is, of course, always more important than any reproduction or replica, but reproductions could play a significant role. In the British Museum, for instance, the photographic plates from Kokka όഏ ဎύ were stored separately from the journals for reference purposes and were boxed according to school. This makes clear how reproductions served as valuable resources for the study of Japanese art in the West. There are, in fact, a number of reproductions of treasures of Hǀrynj-ji temple ऄၼ‫ڝ‬ʳ in the British Museum’s collection. The Hǀrynj-ji is one of 





3



Laws to preserve “antique items” were established: the Proclamation to Preserve Antique Items (Koki kynjbutsu hozon kata ‫ײ‬ᕴ㢛ढঅ‫ )ֱژ‬from the Department of State in 1871 (Meiji 4), the Law for the Preservation of Old Temples and Shrines (Koshaji hozon hǀ ‫ײ‬ष‫ڝ‬অ‫ژ‬ऄ) in 1897 (Meiji 30), the Law for the Preservation of National Treasures (Kokuhǀ hozon hǀ 㧺㨘অ‫ژ‬ऄ) in 1929 (Showa 4) and the Law relating to the Preservation of Important Artworks (Jnjyǀ bijutsuhin tǀ no hozon ni kansuru hǀritsu ૹ૞ભ๬঴࿛垏অ‫ژ‬垌䈅坺垬ऄ৳) in 1933 (Showa 8). After the Pacific War, the Law for the Protection of Cultural Properties (Bunkazai hogo hǀ ֮֏ತঅᥨऄ) was established in 1950 (Showa 25). 4 Many surveys were conducted, among them the Jinshin kensa in 1872 (Meiji 5) by Machida Hisanari ᮫ ‫ ض‬Ն ‫( ګ‬1838-1897) and Ninagawa Noritane ፲ ՟ ‫ ڤ‬ા (1835-1882), and the Shaji hǀmotsu chǀsa ष‫ڝ‬㨘ढᓳ㬾 in 1882 (Meiji 15) and 1888 (Meiji 21) by Okakura Kakuzǀ ࡽପ㽱Կ (1863-1913) and Ernest Fenollosa (1853-1908).

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the world oldest wooden buildings, which was founded in 607 (Suiko Tennǀ 15). The wall painting and series of Buddhist statues in Hǀrynj-ji are regarded as highlights of current Japanese art history. It is clear that the British Museum was interested in acquiring the works of Hǀrynj-ji, but it could be argued that at the same time, Japanese were trying to introduce the works of Hǀrynj-ji in particular to the West. The British Museum’s collection includes a traced copy of the wall painting of the Golden Hall of Hǀrynj-ji temple. 5 It is an unmounted, life-size tracing of The Pure Land of Maitreyaπ㨮೬㭔Ւ㤾ρʳ (Fig. 4-1), number nine in the sequence, of wall paintings. It was thought to be produced by Sakurai Kǀun 䰺մଉႆʳ (1840-1895?) who was a pupil of Tanaka Ynjbi ‫ض‬խ‫ڶ‬ભ (1840-1933), a painter of the revivalist yamato-e school (fukko yamato-e-ha ༚‫ײ‬Օࡉ㽇੔). It is known that in 1884 (Meiji 17), after leaving Ynjbi’s studio, at his teacher’s recommendation, Kǀun became involved in making reproductions of the wall paintings in the Hǀrynj-ji temple to be preserved in the Imperial Museum. These are now stored in the Tokyo National Museum. The copy of the Hǀrynj-ji wall painting in the British Museum was originally presented by a British diplomat Ernest Satow (1843-1929) to the collector of Japanese paintings, William Anderson (1842-1900) who sold most of his collection to the British Museum in 1881. Satow’s diary notes that Satow and Anderson visited Hǀrynj-ji temple on 8 December 1879 (Meiji 12) (Satow 1992, 231). They saw many temple treasures, such as a fragment of a mandala, paintings and old documents, but there is no mention of the wall paintings. However, there is a clue in one of the renown art journals in Japan at the time, Tǀyǀ kaiga sǀshi㻃όࣟ੉㽇㪃ហ፾ύ. In the section on the wall paintings of Hǀrynj-ji temple, it says, 



The Buddhist paintings on the wall of the Kondǀ in Hǀrynj-ji temple in Yamato [Nara] were done by a Buddhist monk, Donchǀ [who came to Japan from Goguryeo] … Some years ago, when a British man (called Mr Satow) visited Kyoto, he saw these paintings and praised them as a unique work in the world. He then asked a Kyoto painter, Sakurai Kǀun (now working for Osaka Museum), to make a reproduction of a painting. Mr [Sakurai] exercised his ingenuity and fully copied the painting and sent it [to Satow]. 5

This painting was made before Anderson’s return to Britain in 1880. According to Sugiyama Keisuke, Senior Conservator of Japanese Paintings at the British Museum, in the 1880s, painters did not have skills to take photographs and enlarge it to life-size and trace the photograph as we do today. In fact, the outline of the painting is very clear. Therefore, the painter of this painting must have stuck transparent paper on the wall itself and traced the painting (Private communication).

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81

After that, he copied the painting again and offered it to the Museum Department [Hakubutsukyoku ໑ढ‫]ݝ‬, and it became part of the collection of the museum. Now, Osaka prefecture has ordered him to copy three large parts and eight small parts, in total eleven parts of the wall painting … (Tǀyǀ 1884, 17-9)

In other words, even there is no record that they saw the wall paintings on their visit to Hǀrynj-ji temple in 1879, we now know that Satow asked Kǀun to replicate the painting, which work is now in the British Museum. Kǀun then replicated the paintings, and these are now in the Tokyo National Museum. In 1884 (Meiji 17), the Nara County Hall sent a note to Hǀrynj-ji temple, saying that the wall painting of the Kondǀ was a precious relic of the past. In order to have it in the collection of the Hakubutsukyoku, they would like to ask Sakurai Kǀun to make a reproduction of the painting (Hǀrynj-ji 1995, 95). At the time Satow and Anderson saw the wall paintings at Hǀrynj-ji, the Japanese were not particularly active in producing reproductions of paintings. However, Kǀun’s replicating project in 1884 (Meiji 17), which was commissioned by the government, has been inspired by a suggestion from the British collector Ernest Satow. Satow certainly knew that the works in Hǀrynj-ji were very important examples in the history of Japanese art. Anderson writes in The Pictorial Arts of Japan (1886) that One of the least doubtful of the ancient pictorial relics still in existence is a Buddhist mural decoration in the Hall of Hǀrinjji, which is said to date from the foundation of the temple in A.D. 607, and was probably the work of a Korean priest. It compares not unfavourably with the later productions of the Buddhist school, and both in colouring and composition bears much resemblance to the works of the early Italian Masters (Anderson 1886, 8-9).

Another example of reproduction of Hǀrynj-ji treasure was acquired in the later period. This was a life-size reproduction of the Kudara Kannon π ‫ۍ‬㶙䕋ଃρsculpture (Fig. 4-2) at the Horynj-ji. It was commissioned by the Trustees of the British Museum from Niiro Chnjnosuke ᄅ ౏ ࢘ հ տʳ (1869-1954), 6 “the chief restorer of works of art”, and was purchased from 

6



Niiro Chnjnosuke graduated from the Department of Sculpture at Tokyo School of Fine Arts ࣟࠇભ๬䝤ீʳ and worked as an Associate Professor of Sculpture there. He left the School with Okakura Kakuzǀ in 1898 (Meiji 31) and became a founding member of Japan Art Institute (Nihon bijutsu-in ֲ‫ء‬ભ๬ೃ) and worked in the Inten ೃ୶ (the exhibition of Nihon bijutsu-in) circle. He was then deeply involved in restoring Buddhist statues under the guidance of Okakura.

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him directly in 1932 with the financial support of Sir Percival David (1892-1964), 7 the National Art Collections Fund and Mrs Alex Whyte [wife of Alexander Whyte (1836-1921), a Scottish divine]. 8 When Binyon visited Japan around 1930 (Showa 5), he said to Niiro that he liked Kudara Kannon best among all Buddhist statues in Japan and asked whether there was anyone who could produce a reproduction of the statue. Niiro did not say whether he could do it or not, but Binyon later wrote to Niiro that he was the only one person who could produce it (The Japan Art Institute 2003, 93). On receiving the order from the British Museum in 1929 (Showa 4), Niiro began making two reproductions. One went to the British Museum and the other to the Tokyo National Museum. 9 When this version of the Kudara Kannon was purchased by the British Museum, The Times immediately reported the news. The article carefully explains the details of the work and how it came to enter the Museum’s collection: 









Neither the original nor a cast being available, the Trustees commissioned Mr. Ni Ino [sic], who is the principal restorer to the Japanese Government museums, to make a replica. The statue was mentioned by the Archbishop of Canterbury in his speech in the House of Lords on February 29, when he indicated that it had cost between £600 and £700 … (Anonymous 1932) 7 Sir Percival David was a collector of Chinese ceramics. His collection of 1,700 pieces (many from the Chinese imperial collection), administered by the Percival David Foundation, is on long-term loan to the British Museum. 8 The Trustees’ Minutes, 12 March 1932, 4865d. Read a report from Mr Joyce, 5 March, in the absence of Mr Hobson, reporting the arrival from Japan of the copy of the seventh century wooden statue known as the Kudara Kwannon, one of the most famous in Japan. The copy was commissioned by the Trustees from the leading expert in the restoration of works of art for the Japanese, Mr Niiro. The original, which was in the temple at Nara, represented a Boddhisatva [sic], and was rather over life-size. The price was 6,000 yen, with carriage 6,254.09 yen, equivalent to about £627. Towards this the following sums had been contributed:Sir Percival David ---------------------------- £250 The National Art-Collections Fund -------- £100 Mrs Alex Whyte ------------------------------ £10 A sum of £100 was also available from the balance of the purchase grant of the Sub-Department of Oriental Prints and Drawings. This left the amount of about £167, which Mr Joyce recommended should be paid out of the Reserve (c. 4631). The Trustees approved. 9 According to Dr Lucia Dolce (SOAS, University of London), there are two reproductions of Buddhist statues made by Niiro around the same time as the Kudara Kannon, in the Museum für Ostasiatische Kunst in Cologne, Germany.

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83

The fact that the Archbishop of Canterbury mentioned it in the House of Lords suggests the importance of this purchase for the Museum. The acquisition also featured on the opening page of the British Museum Quarterly in 1932. Laurence Binyon noted that Mr Niiro’s replica has been executed with extraordinary sensitiveness and subtlety, and will enable lovers of art in England to appreciate the exquisite quality of the religious quality of the era … (Binyon 1932, 1)

When Binyon visited Japan in late 1929 (Showa 4) and early 1930 (Showa 5), he gave six lectures in Tokyo and spent the rest of his stay studying Japanese art. He visited museums, private collections, temples and monasteries, to study Buddhist art in particular. 10 Binyon studied Japanese art from native Japanese sources and knew the importance of Buddhist sculpture in the history of Japanese art. His desire to acquire authentic Japanese Buddhist sculpture must have been stimulated by this experience. Sculpture was regarded as one of the highest arts in the West, so Binyon has likely thought that high quality Japanese sculpture would be an excellent choice to present Japanese art to British audiences. 11 It was noted in a Japanese account that this reproduction of Kudara Kannon was exhibited at the British Museum with the label stating that it was made by Niiro, and it attracted many visitors. 12 As explained above, a number of Westerners contributed to the making of reproductions of Japanese masterpieces in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. In most cases it was the Westerners who provided motivation for the Japanese to produce reproductions. Matsuura Masaaki points out that Machida Hisanari, who initiated the series of reproduction projects, recognised the importance of reproducing classical works when he saw the Admonitions handscroll at the British Museum (Matsuura 2005, 8). It is possible to say, therefore, that it was Westerners who made the Japanese realise the importance of copying artworks in order to preserve old masterpieces. There was certainly a strong interaction between Japan and the West. To sum up, there were two streams interacting with each other, Western 









10

The Trustees’ Minutes, 8 February 1930, c. 4631. Binyon once again asked Niiro to produce a replica of Nyoirin Kannonπ‫ڕ‬რᔚ 䕋ଃρof Chnjgnj-ji խ୰‫ ڝ‬temple, but due to the failure of fund raising, it never happened. 12 Matsumoto Narashige ࣪‫ૹ⛳ء‬, “Kosetsu ǀ kaikynj dansǀ” ψ‫ౖࢿײ‬䎁㢛ᓫʳ ហω, Nihon bijutsu kǀgei όֲ‫ء‬ભ๬ՠड़ύ133 (1949), reprinted in The Japan Art Institute 2003, 94. 11

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and Japanese. Europe’s history of making reproductions dates back 2,000 years to Roman times. Japan has its own tradition of making reproductions, particularly where the preservation of fragile wooden building were concerned. However, the Japanese seem, in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, to have been stimulated to make reproductions of paintings and sculptures as a result of their interaction with the West. Reproductions are used for preservation and education purposes in the museum context. Both in the West and in Japan, travelling was relatively restricted in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and thus reproductions of well-known masterpieces in museum collections served as stimulating and informative sources for those who would never have the chance to see the original objects on site. The Westerner’s aim of acquiring reproductions and the Japanese aim of producing reproductions came together simultaneously. We cannot ignore the role of reproductions in the history of Japanese art, as they were central figures in introducing Japanese art to the West in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Works Cited Manuscript Sources The Trustees’ Minutes of the British Museum, 8 February 1930 and 12 March 1932, c. 4631, 4865.

Printed Sources Anderson, William. 1886. The Pictorial Arts of Japan. London: Sampson Low, Marston, Searle & Rivington. Anonymous. 1932. British Museum Purchases. The Times, March 14, 8. Binyon, Laurence. 1932. Replica of a Statue of Kwannon. British Museum Quarterly VII, 1: 1. Hǀrynj-ji, ed. 1995. Hǀrynj-ji saigen hekiga όऄၼ‫ڝ‬٦෼ᕻ㪃ύ. Tokyo: Asahi Shimbun. The Japan Art Institute. 2003. Niiro Chnjnosuke 50 kaiki kinen: Butsuzǀ shnjri 50 nen όᄅ౏࢘հտնԼ‫ݲڃ‬ಖ࢚ʳ㡗ቝଥ෻նԼ‫ڣ‬ύ. Kyoto: The Japan Art Institute. Jenkins, Ian. 1992. Archaeologists & Aesthetes: In the Sculpture Galleries of the British Museum 1800-1939. London: British Museum Press. Matsuura, Masaaki ࣪௥‫إ‬ਟ. 2005. Yomigaeru hotoketachi ψ坒坉圖園 坕㡗圩圫ω. In Mosha, mozǀ to Nihon bijutsu: Utsusu, manabu, tsutaeru

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όᑓ㡹埛ᑓທ圲ֲ‫ء‬ભ๬Ё圐圮圣埛坈圴址垸圮圩園坕Ёύ, 7-15. Tokyo: Tokyo National Museum. Pearce, Susan M. 1995. On Collecting: An Investigation into Collecting in the European Tradition. Oxon: Routledge. Satǀ, Dǀshin ۸ᢏሐॾ. 2005. Kindai Nihon no mosha, mozǀ ψ२‫ءֲז‬ 圸ᑓ㡹埛ᑓທω. In Mosha, mozǀ to Nihon bijutsu: Utsusu, manabu, tsutaeru, 17-23. Tokyo: Tokyo National Museum. Satow, Ernest. 1992. Nihon ryokǀ nikki όֲ‫ء‬ள۩ֲಖύ, Vol. 2. Trans. Shǀda Motoo. Tokyo: Heibonsha. Satow, Ernest Mason, and Albert George Sidney Hawes. 1884. A Handbook for Travellers in Central and Northern Japan. 2nd ed. London: Lond. & c. Suzuki, Hiroyuki ር ֵ ᐖ հ . 2008. Dare ga Nihon bijutsushi o tsukuttanoka?: Meiji shoki ni okeru tabi to shnjshnj to kakimono ψᓴ圖 ֲ‫ء‬ભ๬‫׾‬坜‫܂‬圭圩圸圕ΛЁࣔएॣཚ圵圔圛坕ள圲㡨ႃ圲஼圗 ढЁω. Center for Comparative Japanese Studies Annual Bulletin 4: 103-11. Tokyo National Museum. 2005. Mosha mozǀ to Nihon bijutsu: Utsusu, manabu, tsutaeru. Tokyo: Tokyo National Museum. Tǀyǀ kaiga kai shoshibu, ed. 1884. Tǀyǀ Kaiga Sǀshi όࣟ੉㽇㪃ហ፾ύ. Tokyo: Inshokan. Weston, Victoria. 2003. Institutionalizing Talent and the Kano Legacy at the Tokyo School of Fine Arts, 1889-1893. In Copying the Master and Stealing His Secrets, ed. Brenda G. Jordan and Victoria Weston, 147-77. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press. Williamson, Paul, ed. 1996. European Sculpture at the Victoria and Albert Museum. London: Victoria and Albert Museum.

Internet Sources Victoria and Albert Museum. Introduction to the Cast Court Collection. http://www.vam.ac.uk/collections/sculpture/cast_collection/cast_introd uction/index.html

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Fig. 4-1. Attributed to Sakurai Kǀun, Miroku jǀdo zu (copy), 1870-80s. Ink and colour on paper. 310 x 248cm. The William Anderson collection, the British Museum. © The Trustees of the British Museum.

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Fig. 4-2. Niiro Chnjnosuke, Kudara Kannon (copy), 1920. Carved and painted wood, gesso and bronze. © The Trustees of the British Museum.

CHAPTER FIVE THE INFLUENCE OF JAPANESE EXPERTISE ON THE BRITISH RECEPTION OF CHINESE PAINTING 1 

MICHELLE YING LING HUANG

The encounters between Britain, Japan and China brought about by trade, travel and colonialism from the mid-nineteenth to the early twentieth century significantly aroused the British interest in the collections and historical study of Oriental art. Following the vogue for a Chinese style in the architecture, garden, as well as fine and decorative arts of eighteenth-century Europe, Chinese export painting, ceramics, bronze, jade, lacquer, textile and all kinds of Chinoiserie objects were imported in large quantities into Britain and sold through the East India Company, auction houses, private collectors and art dealers in the nineteenth century. However, Chinese painting, which is the central and most typical Chinese art, remained unexplored in the West. Under the Anglo-Japanese Treaty of Amity and Commerce signed in Edo (now Tokyo) in 1858, the Tokugawa Shogunate 䄧 ՟ ኟ ࢌ was compelled to open more treaty ports, including Edo, Kobe, Nagasaki, Niigata and Yokohama, for foreign trade. The opening of Japan’s diplomatic and commercial relations with the United States, Britain and other European countries created substantial demand for Japanese objects, including porcelains, ukiyo-e prints, lacquer wares, fans and screens, in the West. The great vogue for things Japanese in Paris and London opened up the phenomenon of Japonisme which spread across Europe and the United 1

Early versions of this chapter were originally presented at the 12th Asian Studies Conference Japan (ASCJ) at the Rikkyo University in Tokyo in 2008 and published in the St Andrews Journal of Art History and Museum Studies 13 (2009). I acknowledge the Burnwynd History and Art Limited, the Wilhelmina Barns-Graham Charitable Trust, and the Carnegie Trust for the Universities of Scotland, for funding this research project.

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States between the 1860s and the 1890s. In England and Scotland, British merchants, collectors and artists developed a strong interest in collecting Japanese objects, which not only became popular decorations for houses and drawing rooms, but also inspired artists and designers with new subject matter and aesthetic ideas.2 While Europeans were obsessed with Japanese art, Japan strove energetically to modernise and westernise the country during the Meiji era (1868-1912 AD). Lavish Japanese displays were mounted at major and minor exhibitions in Britain and France, leading to a commercial and cultural dialogue between Japan and Europe. Japanese curators and artists came to London to study museums and painting methods. They also presented their native views on Oriental art to Westerners, with special focus on the national ideal, art and life of Japan. Japanese expertise became a significant factor in shaping the British conception of the arts of Japan and China. In particular, British collectors and connoisseurs discerned that Japanese and Chinese art have “so much in common that they will always be ranked together when a comparison is instituted between the art productions of the East and West” (The Burlington Fine Arts Club 1878). However, at that time China’s art and culture was generally overlooked in favour of Japan’s. When, around 1900, Laurence Binyon (1869-1943), a dedicated curator of Prints and Drawings from the British Museum, formulated his view of Chinese pictorial art, Japanese graphic and applied arts were still in fashion in Europe. From his encounter with Japanese woodblock prints to his contacts with Japanese scholars, Binyon’s conception of Chinese painting was persistently influenced by Japanese expertise and the writings on Oriental art by collectors, scholars and sinologists from Japan and Europe. This paper demonstrates how Japanese expertise influenced Binyon’s study of Chinese painting and the British Museum’s curatorial practice at the turn of the twentieth century. I will investigate the first major national collection of traditional Chinese paintings brought from Japan to the British Museum in London, followed by a discussion of the curatorial exchange between Japanese and Western scholars of Oriental art. Binyon’s study of early English publications on Oriental painting and the British Museum’s use of Japanese expertise in the cataloguing and conservation projects of Chinese painting will also be examined.

2

For details, see Burty 1875, 150; Sato and Watanabe 1991, 14-5; Ono 2003, 5-40.

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Early Acquisitions of Chinese Paintings from Japan Despite its important role in introducing an appreciation of Chinese painting to the general public, the British Museum’s collections of Chinese paintings was formed very slowly and haphazardly in the nineteenth century because of a lack of fine specimens and limited knowledge of the subject. Sir Sidney Colvin (1845-1927), Keeper of Prints and Drawings (1883-1912), explained: Though the decorative and applied arts of China and Japan had for two centuries and more been the objects of enthusiastic study, collection, and imitation in the West, their pictorial arts … were almost unknown until the Trustees of the British Museum acquired in 1881 the very extensive collection formed by the late Mr. William Anderson, … during his residence in Japan as medical officer to the British Legation (The British Museum, Department of Prints and Drawings 1910, 3).

Dr William Anderson (1842-1900), a Scottish surgeon and Professor of Anatomy and Surgery at the Imperial Naval Medical College at Tokyo, 3 built a vast collection of Japanese and Chinese paintings, books and other objects during his residence in Japan between 1873 and 1880. On 25 May 1881, Anderson offered for sale his collection of about a thousand hanging and scroll paintings and a very large number of unmounted drawings on silk and paper for the price of £3,000. 4 To encourage the acquisition of the Anderson collection, Sir Augustus Wollaston Franks (1826-1897), Keeper of British and Mediaeval Antiquities and Ethnography (1866-97), wrote to George Reid (1819-1897), Keeper of Prints and Drawings (1866-83), “expressing a high opinion of the artistic value of the collection, and advising its immediate purchase”, because more than one foreign dealer (including French dealers) was anxious to secure it. 5 On 28 November 1881, the Trustees and the Treasury approved the purchase of the Anderson collection, which became a valuable source for the study of Japanese and 











3 For Anderson’s background, see Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, online article 508; Matsui, Koyama and Makita 1996, 163-5. 4 Apart from about 3,040 Japanese paintings and drawings, other items included carvings on wood and ivory, metal work and 114 Chinese paintings. See Dr William Anderson to the British Museum, 25 May and 27 September 1881, Original Papers, the British Museum Central Archive, London (hereafter OP-BMCA), Vol. 77, P No. 2201, 4097. 5 Minutes of Meetings of Trustees’ Standing Committee, the British Museum Central Archive, London (hereafter MMTSC-BMCA), 12 November 1881, Vol. 40, 15782-3.

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Chinese painting in Britain. 6 With Anderson’s intense enthusiasm for the collecting and study of Japanese art, one might doubt his taste for a small section of 114 Chinese paintings, which he added to demonstrate the relationship between the arts of Japan and China. 7 Unlike Franks and Colvin who found early Chinese paintings of high artistic value, Anderson very much admired the style and skills of Japanese painters from modern periods. Anderson’s Descriptive and Historical Catalogue of a Collection of Japanese and Chinese Paintings in the British Museum (1886) which was compiled “with the help of the best native and other authorities” reflects his stronger interest in Japanese art. 8 He described Chinese pictorial art in the Ming dynasty (1368-1644 AD) as “a steady and progressive decadence”, which extended to the beginning of the nineteenth century (Anderson 1886a, 489). By contrast, “Japanese have created for themselves an individuality, both in motives and treatment, that has altogether reversed the former relations of the two countries” (Ibid., 491-2). With his personal preference for a particular painting style, Anderson’s understanding of both early and modern Chinese pictorial art was relatively limited, as was the authenticity and quality of the Chinese paintings he purchased in Japan. Without much prior knowledge of the authentic style of Oriental painting, the British public believed that each of the paintings in the Anderson collection “is authenticated either by writing upon the painting itself, or by strong external evidence, or by both” (Anonymous 1888, 4). In the 1880s, the Anderson collection was recognised as the nucleus of 





6





MMTSC-BMCA, 10 December 1881, Vol. 40, 15807. In the small section of “Chinese Pictorial Art”, Anderson introduced 117 Chinese paintings in his Descriptive and Historical Catalogue of a Collection of Japanese and Chinese Painting (1886). It also recorded nineteen modern copies from Chinese pictures which were mainly produced by Japanese artists in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. However, the total number of Chinese paintings in the Anderson collection varies according to the different judgments and classifications of Chinese and Japanese paintings by Anderson and other Asian scholars who later were invited to offer expert help in cataloguing the British Museum’s collections of Oriental paintings and prints. 8 In the Descriptive and Historical Catalogue, Anderson classified the paintings according to schools and gave a general account of the history of each school, with a list of principal artists whose names were included in native biographical records. In 1886, he also published The Pictorial Arts of Japan, which introduced the history, technique, forms and characteristics of “Sinico-Japanese painting”, together with a review of different applications of pictorial design. See Anderson 1886a, v; Anderson 1886b. For Anderson’s taste in Japanese painting, see Princess Akiko of Mikasa 2007, 123-5.ʳ 7

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the collection of Chinese painting at the British Museum. It was also the first to introduce Chinese painting in the forms of hanging scroll and handscroll. Most of the works were painted in ink and colours or on silk. The subject matter of the collection consists mainly of immortal figures and sage, animals, birds and flowers, with relatively few landscapes. Most reflect Japanese taste and were in keeping with British taste in Chinese painting. The Anderson collection included a few fine examples of birds and flowers painting. For example, a pair of hanging scrolls, Pheasants and Other Birds, with Plum-tree and Ducks and Various Small Birds, with Willow and Plum-trees (Fig. 5-1) showed the style of Lu Ji ‫ܨ‬ધʳ (c. 1439-1505) who excelled in painting birds and flowers with different styles in the Ming dynasty. 9 Nevertheless, some paintings in the Anderson collection were possibly painted by artists in Japan and China for the foreign market. Even though some of them might be produced by Chinese painters, they were likely made in a period later than the date attributed by Anderson. For instance, A Pair of Cranes (Fig. 5-2) bore a signature of the Northern Song (960-1127 AD) master Mi Fu ‫ۏ‬य़ (1051-1107), yet its style indicates a false attribution of authorship. The heavy use of colour, the awkward postures and the decorative details of the cranes show that this set of hanging scrolls was a fake and seems to be painted in the style of a Ming painter, Wen Zheng ֮ ‫( إ‬dates unknown), in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. 10 It adopts a popular and propitious subject, but bore a forged seal and signature of Mi Fu. Apart from the problem of inaccurate attribution, Anderson also wrongly classified Japanese and Chinese paintings into their respective categories. For instance, one Japanese painting was wrongly included in the catalogue of Chinese painting, whereas five Chinese paintings were included in the section of Japanese painting (Binyon 1905, 56-7). Anderson thought that The Nirvâna of S’âkyamuni was a Chinese painting by Li Longmian ‫ޕ‬ᚊఠ (c. 1049-1105), but later experts re-attribute it to a Japanese work of the Buddhist school by Kose no Hirotaka ؎Ⴈ㢔၆ (fl. late ninth-early tenth century) in the twelfth century. Anderson’s unreliable attribution and classification of Chinese paintings implies that there is now an urgent need to revise the Descriptive and Historical Catalogue of a Collection of Japanese and Chinese Paintings in the British Museum with 



9





For another fine painting of insects and flowers in the Anderson collection, see Huang 2010c,281. 10 Wen Zheng was a Ming artist famous for painting cranes. See curators’ comments in the British Museum Collection Database, museum nos. Ch.Ptg.47, Ch.Ptg.48.

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the assistance of authoritative experts.

Curatorial Exchanges between Western and Japanese Scholars Interestingly, Anderson and Colvin did not consult any Chinese scholar on the study of Chinese painting but sought advice from European scholars and collectors, as well as Japanese experts who came to London for cultural exchanges. Kohitsu Ryǀnin ‫ ײ‬࿝ Ա ٚ (1875-1933) from the Tokyo Imperial Museum (now Tokyo National Museum), a descendant of the famous Kohitsu family which had long been well-known as connoisseurs of painting and calligraphy since the seventeenth century, was the most skilled of living authorities on early Japanese painting first known among the British Museum circle. In the spring of 1902, Colvin employed Kohitsu to work on the British Museum’s collections of Oriental paintings for one month. 11 Kohitsu assisted in cataloguing acquisitions of Japanese and Chinese paintings, including the gift of paintings and woodcuts presented by the late Sir Augustus Franks. Kohitsu’s guidance in revising the authenticity of the Anderson collection, adding explanatory notes and making corrections to the Descriptive and Historical Catalogue of a Collection of Japanese and Chinese Paintings in the British Museum facilitated Laurence Binyon’s study of Oriental painting. 12 By the early twentieth century, art collectors and national museums in Britain were showing a growing interest in traditional Chinese painting. With the support of Sir Sidney Colvin, Binyon became a prominent figure in promoting the appreciation of Chinese painting by turning it into a 





11



Colvin recommended the Trustees to employ Kohitsu for about one month in March and April 1902, at the rate of £1 per day. See Colvin’s reports to the Trustees, 7 March and 6 June 1902, in the Reports at the Department of Prints and Drawings, the British Museum, London (hereafter RDPD-BM). 12 Kohitsu Ryǀnin made a careful examination of the Franks collection of Japanese and Chinese paintings, and found it of “sufficient interest and value to be retained for the collection.” Anderson’s Descriptive and Historical Catalogue was largely revised by Binyon with the help of Kohitsu. The work of inserting additions and corrections in an interleaved copy of Anderson’s Catalogue was done in the autumn and winter of 1902. Subsequent curators and visiting scholars at the British Museum also made additional notes on their views of the authorship and dating of selected paintings in the Anderson collection. See Colvin’s reports to the Trustees on 1 September and 1 October 1902, 30 January 1903, in RDPD-BM. Also see Binyon’s handwritten notes in the two-volume annotated copy of Descriptive and Historical Catalogue at the Japan Student Room.

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scholarly and independent study. Binyon was a talented poet and a graduate of Trinity College, Oxford. He was initially appointed as the Second Class Assistant in the Department of Printed Books in 1893, and transferred to the Department of Prints and Drawings in 1895. He first worked on European drawings and engraving but gradually became involved in several projects of Oriental painting when Colvin began, during the later years of his Keepership, to take an ardent interest in enriching the Museum’s collections of Chinese and Japanese art (Lucas 1928, 184). Binyon first encountered ukiyo-e prints from his friends’ collections, such as those of Charles Ricketts (1866-1931) and Charles Shannon (1863-1937), 13 and studied Japanese ink paintings in the Anderson collection, with the aid of the Descriptive and Historical Catalogue and its companion The Pictorial Arts of Japan as additional references. More importantly, Kohitsu Ryǀnin, during his stay in London between December 1901 and July 1903, went through the Anderson collection with Binyon and gave him a lesson on Japanese connoisseurship. Binyon’s time in 1902 was very largely taken up, with the help of Kohitsu and Arthur Morrison (1863-1945), in studying and re-classifying the collections of Chinese and Japanese paintings and woodcuts, and in completing and expanding the departmental copy of Anderson’s catalogue. 14 Binyon later recognised Kohitsu as his “invaluable helper towards appreciation of the spirit and character of Japanese and Chinese art” in his Painting in the Far East (1908) (Binyon 1908, ix). Arthur Morrison, who wrote fiction and journalism, had, since 1890, formed a collection of works of art from Japan and China, especially Japanese paintings, woodcuts and porcelains. 15 His articles on “The 



13





Charles Ricketts and Shannon formed together a fine collection of European old master drawings and paintings, and from the late 1890s began to collect objects of Oriental art, including Japanese prints and drawings. Sometimes Binyon took his guests to see Ricketts’s collection. Ricketts also provided advice on the quality of the British Museum’s collections of Japanese prints. The two artists later bequeathed the main part of their collection to the British Museum and the Fitzwilliam Museum. See Darracott 1980, 136-7; Binyon to Ricketts, 10 February 1916, Ricketts and Shannon Papers, British Library, London, 58091, Vol. VII, ff.3-4. 14 Colvin’s report to the Trustees, 30 January 1903, in RDPD-BM, 4-5. 15 The Arthur Morrison collection, which comprised over 600 specimens of Japanese painting and a small portion of about forty Chinese paintings, was presented as a gift by Sir William Gwynne-Evans (1845-1927) to the British Museum in 1913. Selected Japanese and Chinese paintings of the Morrison collection were exhibited at the Museum in 1914. For details, see Huang 2010a, 138-40.

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Painters of Japan” were published in the Monthly Review between July 1902 and January 1903. A much richer and complete two-volume The Painters of Japan (1911) was published nine years later, with guidance from Kohitsu and assistance from many of his Japanese friends. Morrison’s understanding of Oriental art also owed much to The Kokka πഏဎρʳ (National Flower) magazine and other relevant publications by William Anderson, Ernest Fenollosa (1853-1908), Captain Francis Brinkley (1841-1912), Okakura Kakuzo ࡽପ㽱Կ (also known as Okakura Tenshin ࡽପ֚֨, 1862-1913) and others. 16 The account of several schools of Japanese art in Morrison’s The Painters of Japan was reminiscent of Anderson’s Descriptive and Historical Catalogue. Interestingly, after ten years training, Binyon realised the drawback of Anderson’s scholarship: 



The weakness of that most valuable pioneer work was the inadequacy of its author’s aesthetic judgment: he applied a standard of conventional realism which would be grievously at fault in the criticism of European masterpieces, and which had no sort of relations to the aims of the Japanese artists. Mr. Morrison can certainly not be accused of want of sympathy with those aims, or want of understanding of them. Some will rather accuse him of being more Japanese at times than the Japanese themselves (Binyon 1911b, 276).

Through regular contact at the Print Room of the British Museum, 17 Binyon shared Morrison’s interest in Chinese and Japanese painting and admired his knowledge of Japanese connoisseurship acquired from native artists and experts. With his honorary membership of the Association of Japanese Art (Nihon bijutsu kyokai ֲ‫ء‬ભ๬࠰㢸) and his authority among Japanese scholars, Morrison surpassed William Anderson and other Western connoisseurs in both his judgments and knowledge, and corrected earlier writers’ inaccurate interpretations of Japanese art. Binyon also acknowledged in his Painting in the Far East that Morrison’s knowledge and counsel had long aided his study. 18 It is clear that Binyon’s connections with both 



16





Morrison 1911, vii-viii. For Morrison’s literary achievements, see Calder 1985, 276-97. 17 Arthur Morrison’s name first appeared on the Print Room Visitors Book on 3 and 22 December 1897, with other frequent visits made in subsequent years. It is possible that Binyon met Morrison a few years before he worked with Kohitsu Ryǀnin on the project of Japanese and Chinese painting. See Visitors Book at the Print Room of the Department of Prints and Drawings, the British Museum, Vol. 12. 18 Binyon praised Morrison’s interpretation of Japanese art from the native point of view and made a full justice in the discussion of the Tosa school, which was previously misconceived by earlier writers, like Louis Gonse (1846-1921) and

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Japanese experts and British collectors of Oriental art was crucial for building up his knowledge of Chinese and Japanese painting in his early career at the British Museum. With the establishment of the Japan Art Institute (Nihon bijutsu-in ֲ‫ء‬ ભ๬ೃ), founded by Okakura Kakuzo in 1898, Japanese painters visited China, India and Europe for work and study. This gave rise to frequent contacts between Binyon and Japanese scholars who visited London. Through Morrison who had strong connections with Japanese artists and scholars, Binyon met Shimomura Kanzan Հ ‫ ޘ‬䕋 ՞ (1873-1930), Okakura’s protégé, who studied Western watercolour in London’s museums and art schools between February 1903 and April 1905. 19 Binyon showed Shimomura the early Chinese painting, Admonitions of the Court Instructress πՖ‫׾‬ᒥቹρʳ(Fig. 5-3), and even asked him to repair the work (Weston 2004, 244). The Admonitions scroll was acquired from an Indian Army cavalry officer, Capt. Clarence A. K. Johnson (1870-1937), who obtained it in the Summer Palace, Peking (now Beijing) in 1900 after the Boxer Rebellion (1899-1900). 20 It shows painted scenes and a detached group of figures, interrupted by a landscape with a man shooting a pheasant, and with a tiger on a mountain. On the scroll, there are moralising texts by Zhang Hua ്ဎ (c. 232-300), illustrating Confucian ideas about virtue and correct behaviour for ladies of the imperial harem. The parody attacks the excessive behaviour of Empress Jia ᇸ‫( ٿ‬256-300). 21 In his first article on it, “A Chinese Painting of the Fourth Century”, Binyon praised the confident, spontaneous and direct painting style of the scroll. He thought it unlikely to be a copy but the handiwork of a great master (Binyon 1904a, 41). 22 Although the scroll had hitherto been attributed to Gu Kaizhi ᥽ჱհ 















William Anderson. Morrison’s articles on “The Painters of Japan” in the Monthly Review (1902) were useful references for Binyon. See Binyon 1911b, 427-8; Binyon 1908, ix-x. 19 Shimomura Kanzan was a teacher of figure painting at the Tokyo School of Fine Arts. He received a travel grant from the Ministry of Education to travel and study in Europe in 1903-5. See Weston 2004, 239-41. 20 For how the Admonitions scroll came into Capt. Johnson’s possession during the Boxer Rebellion, see Zhang 2003, 277-87; Huang 2010b, 53-7. 21 However, the Admonitions scroll lacks two of the eleven original narrative registers. Several inscriptions found on this scroll were translated by Binyon’s assistant, Arthur Waley (1889-1966), in 1923. See photographic records of Chinese painting in the Department of Asia and the British Museum Collection Database, museum no. Ch.Ptg. 1; Tang 1961, 7. 22 The authenticity of the Admonitions scroll as a genuine work from the hand of Gu Kazhi has been disputed. Issues of the Admonitions scroll’s dating, authorship,

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(c. 344-406) of the Eastern Jin dynasty (317-420 AD), it is now often considered to be a fine copy produced in the Tang dynasty (618-907 AD). The Admonitions scroll is still regarded as the oldest and most important monument of Chinese handscroll painting in existence. It also surpassed the importance of the Anderson collection and stirred Binyon’s passion for the study of Chinese painting. According to Basil Gray (1904-1989), Binyon’s disciple and son-in-law, 23 before the First World War (1914-8) Chinese art was seldom considered independently of Japanese. Indeed, “Chinese art was viewed through Japanese spectacles” (Gray 1971-3, 21). Thus, Binyon and Colvin did not consult any Chinese scholar for the research, exhibition, publication, conservation and reproduction of the Admonitions scroll. Instead, they sought advice from European collectors and sinologists, including Arthur Morrison, Bernard Berenson (1865-1959), Herbert Giles (1845-1935), Édouard Chavannes (1865-1918), Paul Pelliot (1878-1945), and Raphaël Petrucci (1872-1917). They also consulted art historians and connoisseurs from Japan, including Kohitsu Ryǀnin, Fukui Rikichiro ጝ մ ‫૴ ٳ ܓ‬ (1886-1972), Taki Seiichi ㎆ጲԫ (1873-1945), and Tanaka Toyozǀ ‫ض‬խ ⡳䋼 (1881-1948) (McCausland 2005, 698). It is clear that Binyon’s and Colvin’s study of Chinese painting invariably relied on Western and Japanese expertise. Shane McCausland argues that Britain’s deepening understanding of East Asian art mirrored the role of Japan in the early twentieth century, “as a kind of displaced China, a window on China, and a conduit or force for the shaping of British notions of China” (Ibid., 697). With her military success from the 1890s to the 1910s, Japan’s parity was finally recognised by the Western powers. McCausland also believes that the 1910 Japan-British Exhibition at the White City in London was an important event which marked 



the end of an Orientalist japonisme and the beginning of a more serious encounter with Japanese culture and, along with it, the founding East Asian provenance and its influence on the reception of Chinese painting in a later socio-historical context have long been discussed among Asian and Western scholars. For an extensive discussion of the Admonitions scroll, see McCausland 2003. 23 Basil Gray had taken the Assistantship in the Department of Prints and Drawings a year after Arthur Waley resigned at the end of 1929. Gray later transferred to a new Department of Oriental Antiquities in 1933 after Binyon’s retirement. In the same year, he married to Binyon’s elder daughter Nicolete Binyon (1911-1997). See Griffiths and Williams 1987, 25.

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Chapter Five culture to which Japan was also turning, that of China ... Japan had, by 1910, become positioned as a key mediator between the West and Asia, and it was through Japan that the British Museum’s curators moved beyond an understanding shaped through study of the applied arts toward learning more about China’s long painting tradition (Ibid.).

Nevertheless, it became a common practice for the British Museum to invite Japanese experts to assist in the project of Chinese painting in the 1910s and subsequent decades. Between 1910 and 1912, Japanese artists and craftsmen, engravers and printmakers were invited to produce woodblocks for reproducing 100 copies of the Admonitions scroll for the book published in 1912. 24 The Anglo-Japanese cultural exchange was extended from the circle of the British Museum’s curators to other staff members in the conservation studio. According to Colvin, the repairer and restorer of the Department of Prints and Drawings, Stanley Littlejohn (1876-1916), who became increasingly interested in Oriental painting during the 1900s, was familiar “both with the technical questions involved and with Japanese methods in business”. 25 Littlejohn was also able to communicate with Japanese printmakers in their own language. He took this valuable opportunity to “set himself to master the Japanese methods of mounting and secrets of repairing, and was probably the first European to learn how to mount a painting as a Kakemono” (Colvin and Binyon 1918, 16). To deal with the lengthy and difficult task of mounting the Aurel Stein collection of Dunhuang paintings without interrupting similar work on the European collections, the woodblock printer and expert mounter Urushibara Yoshijiro ዪ଺‫૴ڻط‬ʳ (1888-1953), who “has proved himself under Littlejohn’s supervision a diligent and conscientious workman”, was employed by the British Museum on a temporary basis between 1912 and 1920. 26 Through 









24



The British Museum, Department of Prints and Drawings, 1912. After Binyon became the person-in-charge of the newly created Sub-Department of Oriental Prints and Drawings in 1913, he continuously supported Japanese scholars in carrying out copying projects for the Admonitions scroll in the 1920s. Shane McCausland points out that the making of copy served to sustain the strategic alliance between the two leading cultural institutions in Britain and Japan. A series of reproductions of the Admonitions scroll also suggests “the power of the Admonitions to focus interests common to Japan and Britain in art history” in light of “the shared imperialist agenda that had underlain the 1910 Japan-British Exhibition.” For details, see McCausland 2005, 688-96, 699. 25 Colvin to the Trustees, 5 January 1912, OP-BMCA, Vol. 109, P No. 122. 26 Urushibara Yoshijiro was employed on a temporary basis at the wage rate of £3 per week for the working hours from 10:00am to 5:00pm. See Campbell Dodgson to

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the provision of special mounters for Oriental works of art, traditional Japanese mounting techniques were handed down to the Museum’s conservators of Oriental pictorial art, and for several decades were adopted for Chinese painting. It was not until the late twentieth century when Chinese experts, including the current Senior Chinese Painting Conservator Qiu Jinxian ५ᙘ‫ ט‬from Shanghai, were employed to adopt an authentic style for mounting Chinese paintings at the Hirayama Studio of the British Museum. 27 



Early English Writings on Oriental Painting by Japanese Scholars Binyon confessed that, in the infancy of his study of Chinese art and culture, his acquaintance with Chinese painting depended very much on the Japanese (Binyon 1904a, 40). At a time when a business trip to the Far East could not be easily arranged, Binyon acquired a basic knowledge of Japanese and Chinese art from The Kokka, a Japanese-English monthly journal of Oriental art. Launched by Okakura, Takahashi Kenzǀ ೏ᖯ೜Կʳ (1855-1898) and others in 1889, The Kokka became a highly influential channel for the dissemination of ideas about Japanese art for both the Japanese and European public (Notehelfer 1990, 324-6). It illustrated mainly painting and sculpture, as well as Japanese and Chinese applied arts, from the earliest times to the present day. Each issue had about four to five articles on Oriental art, mostly by Japanese scholars, accompanied by four to six woodcuts or line drawings in collotypes. The articles included discussions and research on the arts of Japan and China, with a strong emphasis on Buddhist art. Among the countless pictures in The Kokka, Binyon found the hand-made coloured prints of particularly high quality: Nothing in the way of coloured reproduction made in Europe can compare with the beauty and fidelity of these prints, except possibly the Goupil prints the Trustees, 4 and 5 October 1912, in RDPD-BM; MMTSC-BMCA, 12 October 1912, Vol. 56, 3004; Clark 2001, 335-6. 27 Originally, most of the Oriental art on paper was mounted in standard western-style mounts for storage and exhibition, but Japanese methods and materials were introduced to the British Museum through the temporary employment of Japanese experts in the late nineteenth and the early twentieth centuries, when Asian paintings became more appreciated in Britain. See Kosek 2004, 11-2.

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Chapter Five after Degas’ drawings, which are infinitely more expensive. The Kokka prints are produced in exactly the same manner as the woodcuts we all admire … The skill, the taste, above all the patience requisite may well seem almost incredible beside our hasty commercial ways (Binyon 1904b, 110).

In March 1904, the British Museum purchased 851 plates of reproductions from the bookseller and collector Bernard Quaritch (1819-1899) for £32, “nearly half of them in the finest manner of wood-engraving in colours, from the classical works of Chinese and Japanese painting”. 28 On 24 November, Binyon wrote to his wife Cicely Margaret Powell (1876-1962): “Today I begin a job I shall vastly enjoy—arranging prints from that Japanese magazine which I have had cut up.” 29 He continued: “The reproductions in this magazine were indeed a revelation. For here were things we had not dreamed of” (Binyon 1941, 7). The plates of The Kokka had been detached from the text and arranged according to schools and artists. Binyon found that it helped students find what they want and was convenient for making comparisons. Although reproductions were not as valuable as original works, Binyon recognised that their function and effectiveness could help people study art at their leisure. In particular, reproductions were important for students who could not travel abroad to see original works of art and exhibitions. Binyon found that 







No nation probably has preserved its works of art so continuously and carefully as the Japanese ... Collectors and connoisseurs have always existed in Japan; but, as with us, it was not till photography was applied to the reproduction of pictures that a comparative and trustworthy method of criticism became possible (Binyon 1904b, 110). 30 



During the Meiji era, many significant works of art were acquired by the nobility and rich collectors for their private collections. The reproductions in The Kokka, either in polychrome woodblock or black and white collotype printing, spread an awareness of the national art of Japan to Western audiences. They also provided immediate visual references for Binyon’s study of Oriental art. 28

More reproductions (parts 157-87) were bought at £7.15s in 1906. See MMTSC-BMCA, 9 April 1904 and 12 May 1906, Vols. 51 & 53, 1933, 2215. 29 The detached plates of The Kokka are now kept in hard green boxes at the Department of Asia, the British Museum. See Binyon to Cicely Powell, 24 November [1904], Archive of Laurence Binyon, Loan 103, British Library, London (hereafter ALB-BL), Vol. 60; Binyon 1959, viii. 30 For Binyon’s view of the importance of photography in art education, see Binyon 1896, 322.

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It is not the only Japanese publication of its kind, but, all things considered, it is the best. For the foreign student it is absolutely indispensable, since it illustrates countless pictures, in private hands or in temples, which the traveller never sees. Had it existed earlier, most of the European writers who are accepted as authorities would have been saved from many serious misconceptions (Ibid.). 31 

Binyon’s knowledge of Oriental art was not limited to the illustrations in The Kokka but also owed much to the writings of Okakura Kakuzo. In particular, Okakura’s The Ideals of the East (1903) enlightened Binyon’s understanding of Eastern thought and its close relationship to art. Alongside his mentor Fenollosa, 32 Okakura was able to make use of his Western education and knowledge of traditional Japanese and Chinese treatises to shed light on the value of Japanese national heritage in both his own country and the West. He positioned Japan as “the real repository” of Asia for the study of Oriental art (Notehelfer 1990, 332), and described it as “a museum of Asiatic civilization”. 33 It is noteworthy that Okakura’s interpretation of Eastern thought facilitated Binyon’s understanding of the Admonitions scroll. When he first saw it, Binyon discovered the charm of Gu Kaizhi’s painting style and the Chinese philosophy of Confucianism. These subjects were not recognised in Anderson’s publications. Binyon was also eager to explore the contextual background of the Eastern Jin dynasty, when metaphysics and the belief of Laozi ‫۔‬՗ʳ (600-470 BC) prevailed among the literati, including Gu Kaizhi, the poet-painter of the Laoist School. The Ideals of the East was possibly the first reference for Binyon’s understanding of Laoism, Daoism and Buddhism (Binyon 1904a, 44). In his 





31



Also see Binyon 1906, 415. With the invitation of the American zoologist and Orientalist Edward Morse (1838-1925), Fenollosa went to Japan to teach Philosophy at the Tokyo Imperial University (now the University of Tokyo) in 1878, when Okakura was a second-year student in Philosophy and English. During his stay in Japan, Fenollosa developed a deep interest in Japanese art and haunted antique and second-hand bookstores in Tokyo. Okakura had built up a close relationship with Fenollosa and even served as an interpreter in visiting ancient temples and shrines and in searching out Japanese art objects for Fenollosa’s own collection. In the 1880s, he became an active interpreter of Japanese art in Tokyo. For Fenollosa’s interest in art and his experience in Japan, see Chisolm 1963, 20-75. 33 Okakura also stressed that Japan had “yet more than a museum, because the singular genius of the race leads it to dwell on all phases of the ideals of the past, in that spirit of living Advaitism which welcomes the new without losing the old.” See Okakura 1903, 7-8. 32

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Painting in the Far East, Binyon recommended that readers should consult Okakura’s book for “the trend of thought and development of ideals” (Binyon 1959, 280). He quoted Okakura’s book in a footnote as illuminating how Confucian ideas were developed into actual practice in the state of Han in the first century (Ibid., 59). He also referred to Okakura’s scholarship for the classification of Daoism and Laoism (Ibid., 63). Among various trends of Eastern thought, Okakura very much admired Daoism and Buddhism from South China, with their love of art-expression, intense adoration of nature, love of freedom, and spirit of individualism. Okakura acknowledged the innate love of nature and freedom which was embodied in Chinese literature and landscape painting, and would “bring forth the mighty concept of the Dragon, that awful emblem, born of cloud and mist, of the power of Change” (Okakura 1903, 55). The symbol of the “dragon” became a fascinating icon for Binyon. He named his second book on Oriental art, The Flight of the Dragon (1911), and strongly promoted Daoist thought and the beauty of Song landscape painting. For Europeans who were seeking an antidote to an industrialised society, ancient Eastern religions promised spiritual refreshment and a return to humanity. When Binyon read The Ideals of the East again in 1904, he summarised the thoughts which he wanted to share with Cicely in a letter: What remains—with me most is the Zen idea of a consciousness in man & a parallel consciousness in nature, of which art is the relating link & the only type of perfect life. I think this is a better account of art than any European one. 34 

The thoughts which stimulated Binyon were mainly Daoism and Buddhism, in particular, the Buddhist thought of the Southern School—the Zen sect of Buddhism—which aspired to unify spirit and matter turned to the realisation of individualism (Okakura 1903, 168).
Okakura found that the teaching of the Zen sect was “perfected under the Sung dynasty, by the Southern Chinese mind”. Its ideal was also embodied in the Song landscape art, especially the ink paintings of Emperor Huizong ᚧࡲʳ (1082-1135; r. 1101-1125), Ma Yuan ್ ᎛ (fl. 1190-1224), Xia Gui ୙ ఈ (fl. 1180-c.1230), Muqi ड᝘ʳ (fl. 1200-1270), and Liang Kai ඩᄒʳ (fl. late twelfth-early thirteenth century) (Ibid., 159, 178). Their art embodied the romantic thoughts, including the ideas of individualism, freedom and spirit, as well as a harmonious communion of man and nature, which, according to 34

Binyon to Cicely Powell, 19 August [1904], ALB-BL, Vol. 60.

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Okakura, would dominate modern life. Binyon realised that these new ideas were generally absent from the tradition of Western art. Thus, he shared Okakura’s veneration for Zen Buddhism and took particular interest in exploring the aesthetics and spiritual ideas of Song landscape art. A few years before Binyon reviewed Okakura’s The Ideals of the East, he had already been considering the relationship between religion and poetry. He had been reading George Santayana’s (1863-1952) book on the unity of poetry and religion, Interpretations of Poetry and Religion (1900), which questioned the meaning of life. 35 Okakura deepened Binyon’s vision of the ancient ideals and art of Asia where he found a shared spirit of religion, poetry and art. More importantly, Okakura’s ideas significantly shaped Binyon’s way of seeing Chinese painting. When he gave a lecture on “Chinese Art and Buddhism” at the British Academy in 1936, the idea of Zen Buddhism was still central to Binyon’s interpretation of Chinese painting (Binyon 1936, 19-21). He very much admired Zen for seeking to be in harmony with the ever-changing movement of life. This kind of purely Chinese expression was exemplified in Zen Buddhist painting. Binyon shared the ideas of Chinese artists by perceiving art (as well as poetry) as the embodiment of spiritual ideas and individual consciousness. When early twentieth-century European artists made a conscious search for new modes of expression in modern art, Binyon suggested that Western artists should draw sustenance from the art and ideal of Chinese art, which respond to “an interior need in the heart of mankind” and “feed and fructify the human spirit” (Ibid., 21). In the aesthetic ideas of Chinese painting, Binyon found a means of reconnecting modern European art with common life. 



Conclusion As a result of Anglo-Japanese cultural exchanges, the British way of studying Chinese painting was unavoidably Japanese-oriented and this was 35

George Santayana, Professor of Philosophy at Harvard University, claimed that “religion and poetry are essentially identical in essence, and differ merely in the way in which they are attached to practical affairs.” They had the universal moral function of expressing what are ideal, the meaning and values of existence. Binyon agreed with Santayana that “poetry at his greatest & best, does the same work as religion; it treats facts as an appearance & their ideal import as reality.” He also recommended Santayana’s book as one of the favourite books of 1901. See Santayana 1900, v; Binyon to Powell, 28 September [1903], ALB-BL, Vol. 60; Anonymous 1901, 568.

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true for both Binyon and his colleagues. From his early study of William Anderson’s collection and catalogue of Japanese and Chinese paintings, to his first experience of unrolling the Admonitions scroll, Binyon’s study of Oriental art was devoid of Chinese expertise in the first quarter of the twentieth century. The Kokka and The Ideals of the East had further shaped Binyon’s conception of Chinese painting through Japanese perspectives. No wonder he went to Japanese art dealers, such as the famous Yamanaka & Co. Ltd. ՞խ೸㢸 and the ukiyo-e expert and dealer Inada Hogitaro 䆛 ‫ض‬၅֜૴ (act. 1913-5), when acquiring Japanese and Chinese paintings and woodcuts. 36 In 1929, Binyon received an invitation and sponsorship from his Japanese friends to give six lectures on Landscape in English Art and Poetry (1931) at the Tokyo Imperial University, and to mount a loan exhibition of English watercolours at the Institute of Art Research in Ueno Park on 10-24 October. 37 With the company of Taki Seiichi, Yashiro Yukio ‫ࢉזـ‬ႂ (1890-1975) and other Japanese friends, Binyon had finally gained first-hand experience of studying Japanese and Chinese paintings in both public and private collections. He was also invited to have tea in the house of his old Japanese friend, Shimomura Kanzan, in Yokohama. 38 In his visits to temples and shrines, Noh play theatre and the tea ceremony, Binyon experienced the immense impact of Zen Buddhism on the art and life of Japan in the actual place. Binyon’s only journey to the Far East was an apt indication of the influence of Japan on his lifelong study of Oriental painting. 









36



For instance, Binyon acquired Chinese and Japanese paintings and prints from Inada Hogitaro in 1913-5. He also purchased Chinese paintings from the Yamanaka & Co. Ltd. in 1929-30. See, for examples, MMTSC-BMCA, 9 May and 13 June 1914, Vol. 57, 3240, 3254; MMTSC-BMCA, 11 May and 13 July 1929, 11 October 1930, Vol. 62, 4555, 4577, 4699. 37 Binyon received an invitation from Mr Del Re, Professor of English Literature at the Tokyo Imperial University, and other professors in July 1928. His Far East journey lasted for almost five months, starting from 10 August 1929 to 18 January 1930. He travelled with his wife Cicely and his colleague Robert. L. Hobson (1872-1941), and visited Canada (Vancouver), Korea (Seoul), China (Shenyang, Beijing and Shanghai), Japan (Yokohama, Kobe, Miyajima, Tokyo, Nikko, Nagoya, Nara, Osaka, Kyoto, Hiroshima, and Sendai), and Cambodia. For details, see Binyon’s report to the Trustees, 28 January 1930, OP-BMCA, P No. 432; Hatcher 1995, 243-58. 38 Binyon, Cicely, Sophy and Hobson had tea at the house of Shimomura Kanzan at Yokohama on 15 October 1929. As Cicely Binyon described, it was a place “on a hill looking over the sea & things like Japanese anemones—very tall, grow up out of the grass, not massed but singly.” Cicely Binyon to Nicolete Binyon, 16 October [1929], ALB-BL, Vol. 56.

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Works Cited Manuscript Sources CE4 Original Papers, the British Museum Central Archive, London, Vols. 51, 53, 56-7, 62 & 77. CE3 Minutes of Meetings of Trustees’ Standing Committee, the British Museum Central Archive, London, Vols. 40 & 109 Reports at the Department of Prints and Drawings, the British Museum, London, 1902-3, 1912. Visitors Book at Print Room, the Department of Prints and Drawings, the British Museum, Vol. 12. Ricketts and Shannon Papers, British Library, London, 58091, Vol. VII, ff.3-4. Archive of Laurence Binyon, British Library, London, Loan 103, Vols. 56 & 60.

Printed Sources Anderson, William. 1886a. Descriptive and Historical Catalogue of a Collection of Japanese and Chinese Paintings in the British Museum, London: Longmans & Co. —. 1886b. The Pictorial Arts of Japan. London: Sampson Low & Co. Anonymous. 1888. Japanese Painting at the British Museum. The Times, March 10. —. 1901. Favourite Books of 1901. Academy, December 7. Binyon, Laurence. 1896. The Popularisation of Art. In The Civilisation of Our Day: A Series of Original Essays on Some of its More Important Phase at the Close of the 19th Century, ed. James Samuelson, 320-9. London: Sampson Low, Marston. —. 1904a. A Chinese Painting of the Fourth Century. Burlington Magazine 4, 10: 39-45, 48-9. —. 1904b. A Japanese Magazine of Art. Times Literary Supplement, April 8. —. 1905. A Landscape by Chao Mêng-fu in the British Museum. T’oung Pao 6: 56-7. —. 1906. Japanese Art and Art Criticism, Review of Masterpieces of Thirty Great Painters of Japan by the Kokka Company, Tokio. Times Literary Supplement, December 14. —. 1908. Painting in the Far East. London: Edward Arnold. —. 1911a. The Painters of Japan. Saturday Review 112: 427-8.

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—. 1911b. The Painters of Japan. Times Literary Supplement, July 27. —. 1936. Chinese Art and Buddhism. London: Humphrey Milford. —. 1941. Impressions of Japanese Art. Tokyo: Kukusai Bunka Shinkokai (The Society for International Cultural Relations). —. 1959. Painting in the Far East, 3rd rev. ed. New York: Dover Publications. The British Museum, Department of Prints and Drawings. 1910. Guide to an Exhibition of Chinese and Japanese Paintings (Fourth to Nineteenth Century A.D.) in the Print and Drawing Gallery. London: British Museum. —. 1912. Admonitions of the Instructress in the Palace. London: British Museum. The Burlington Fine Arts Club. 1878. Exhibition of Japanese and Chinese Works of Art. London: Burlington fine Arts Club. Burty, Philippe. 1875. Japonism. The Academy, August 7. Calder, Robert. 1985. Arthur Morrison: A Commentary with an Annotated Bibliography of Writings about Him. English Literature in Transition, 1880-1920 28: 276-97. Chisolm, Lawrence. 1963. Fenollosa: The Far East and American Culture. New Haven and London: Yale University Press. Clark, John. 2001. Japanese Exchanges in Art 1850s-1930s, with Britain, Continental Europe, and the USA. Sydney: Power Publications. Colvin, Sidney, and Laurence Binyon. 1918. The Late Stanley William Littlejohn. Burlington Magazine 32, 178: 16-9. Darracott, Joseph. 1980. The World of Charles Ricketts. Sussex: Eyre Methuen. Gray, Basil. 1971-3. The Development of Taste in Chinese Art in the West 1872 to 1972. Transactions of the Oriental Ceramic Society 39: 19-42. Griffiths, Antony, and Reginald Williams. 1987. The Department of Prints and Drawings in the British Museum User’s Guide. London: British Museum. Hatcher, John. 1995. Laurence Binyon: Poet and Scholar of East and West. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Huang, Ying Ling Michelle ႓ਠੳ. 2010a. The Reception of Chinese Painting in Britain circa 1880-1920, with Special Reference to Laurence Binyon. Ph.D. diss., University of St Andrews. —. 2010b. Laurence Binyon and the Admonitions Scroll. Orientations 41, 5: 53-7. —. 2010c. British Interest in Chinese Painting, 1881-1910: The Anderson and Wegener Collections of Chinese Painting in the British Museum. Journal of the History of Collections 22, 2:279-87.

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Kosek, Joanna. 2004. Conservation Mounting for Prints and Drawings: A Manual Based on Current Practice at the British Museum. London: Archetype in association with British Museum. Lucas, Edward. 1928. The Colvins and Their Friends. London: Methuen & Co. Matsui, Ryugo ࣪ࡺ㲳ն, Noboru Koyama ՛՞ ᤴ, and Kenji Makita ड ‫ض‬೜‫׾‬. 1996. Tatsujintachi no Daiei Hakubutsukan ሒԳ圩圫圸Օ૎ ໑ढᙴ. Tokyo: Kodansha. McCausland, Shane. 2003. Gu Kaizhi and the Admonitions Scroll, Percival David Foundation Colloquies on Art and Archaeology in Asia, No. 21, London: British Museum. —. 2005. Nihonga Meets Gu Kaizhi: A Japanese Copy of a Chinese Painting in the British Museum. Art Bulletin 87: 688-713. Morrison, Arthur. 1911. The Painters of Japan, Vol. 1. London and Edinburgh: T.C. & E.C. Jack. Notehelfer, Fred. 1990. On Idealism and Realism in the Thought of Okakura Tenshin. Journal of Japanese Studies 16: 309-55. Okakura, Kakuzo ࡽପᤚԿ. 1903. The Ideals of the East. London: John Murray. Ono, Ayako. 2003. Japonisme in Britain: Whistler, Menpes, Henry, Hornel and Nineteenth-Century Japan. London: RoutledgeCruzon. Princess Akiko of Mikasa ൐՗Ֆ‫׆‬. 2007. Re-examining the William Anderson Collection 坧坤垫坣垡埛坣垴垁垹坾垴埛坴垭坰坸垨垴٦‫ە‬ . Centre for Comparative Japanese Studies Annual Bulletin ֺለֲ‫ء‬ 䝤ઔߒ坼垴垀垹ઔߒ‫ڣ‬໴㻃4: 123-32. Santayana, George. 1900. Interpretations of Poetry and Religion. New York: Scribner. Sato, Tomoko, and Toshio Watanabe. 1991. Japan and Britain: An Aesthetic Dialogue 1850-1930. London: Lund Humphries in association with the Barbican Art Gallery and the Setagaya Art Museum, Tokyo. Tang, Lan ାᥞ. 1961. Shilun Gu Kaizhi de Huihuaʳ ᇢᓵ᥽ჱհऱᢄ྽. Wen Wu ֮ढ 6: 7-12. Weston, Victoria. 2004. Japanese Painting and National Identity: Okakura Tenshin and His Circle. Ann Arbor, MI: Center for Japanese Studies, University of Michigan. Zhang, Hongxing ്‫ؖ‬ਣ. 2003. The Nineteenth-Century Provenance of the Admonitions Scroll: A Hypothesis. In Gu Kaizhi and the Admonitions Scroll, Percival David Foundation Colloquies on Art and Archaeology in Asia, No. 21, ed. Shane McCausland, 277-87. London: British Museum.

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Internet Sources Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, William Anderson, Online article 508. http://www.oxforddnb.com (accessed November 26, 2006). British Museum Collection Database. “Ch.Ptg. 1, 47-8, 97-8” www.britishmuseum.org/collection (accessed May 4, 2011).

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Fig. 5-1. Attributed to Lu Ji, Pheasants and Other Birds, with Plum-Tree and Ducks and Various Small Birds, with Willow and Plum-Trees, mid-Ming dynasty (c. 1488-1505). Ink and colours on silk. Hanging scroll. 193.1 x 101.3cm. The William Anderson collection, museum numbers Ch.Ptg.97 & Ch.Ptg.98. © The Trustees of the British Museum.

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Fig. 5-2. Claimed to be by Mi Fu but painted in the style of Wen Zheng, A Pair of Cranes. Late Ming to early Qing dynasty (c. seventeenth-eighteenth century). Ink and colours on silk. Hanging scroll. 132.5 x 61.5cm. The William Anderson collection, museum numbers Ch.Ptg.47 & Ch.Ptg.48. © The Trustees of the British Museum.

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Fig. 5-3. After Gu Kaizhi, detail of The Admonitions of the Court Instructress, eighth century. It is now considered to be a Tang dynasty copy of the original. Ink and colours on silk. Handscroll. 24.4 x 343.8cm. Museum number Ch.Ptg.1. © The Trustees of the British Museum.

CHAPTER SIX A LEGACY OF MATSUBAYASHI TSURUNOSUKE IN ST IVES: INTRODUCTION OF THE ART OF JAPANESE CERAMIC MAKING TO THE BRITISH STUDIO POTTERY SHINYA MAEZAKI

This paper presents the first detailed study of the Japanese ceramicist Matsubayashi Tsurunosuke ࣪ ࣥ 呢 հ ‫ ܗ‬㻃 (1894-1932). Matsubayashi stayed in St Ives, Cornwall in 1923-4 and built a Japanese-style three-chambered climbing kiln for Bernard Howell Leach (1887-1979). A leader of the Studio Pottery Movement in Britain and the mingei ‫ا‬ड़ movement in Japan, Bernard Leach is widely acknowledged as one of the most influential potters of the twentieth century. Emanuel Cooper describes: Bernard Leach, potter, artist, writer, poet and one of the great figures of twentieth-century art, played a crucial pioneering role in creating an identity for artist potters in Britain and around the world (Cooper 2003, xi).

Previous studies have focused on the cross-cultural aspect of Leach’s artistic activities as reflected in his ideal: “I have seen a vision of the Marriage of East and West” (Leach 1978, 310). The Leach Pottery attracted young artist-potters for many years. Over 100 potters have learned at the Leach Pottery and they are now called the Leach Legacy (Whybrow 1996, 180-1). This paper aims to re-evaluate Matsubayashi Tsurunosuke’s activities in St Ives and to discuss how he contributed to making the pottery “the birthplace of British studio pottery.” Based on a recent discovery of Matsubayashi’s personal records in his family archive, this research reveals that he not only provided a kiln, but also maintained a sustainable

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113

production system necessary for the survival of the Leach Pottery in its infancy. The first section of this paper will introduce Matsubayashi’s background as a ceramicist, and then his stay at the Leach Pottery will be discussed in detail. Lastly, I will examine how Matsubayashi’s knowledge of Japanese ceramic manufacture was fostered not only in Britain, but also in many other parts of the world.

1894-1922 As the fourth son of Matsubayashi Shǀsai ࣪ࣥࣙ㵰㻃 (1865-1932), the twelfth head of the Asahi-yaki kiln in Kyoto, Matsubayashi Tsurunosuke learned the traditional way of ceramic making from his youth. In 1919, he entered the Kyoto City Ceramic Research Institute as a student apprentice. The institute was established in 1896 and provided Kyoto ceramicists access to the latest scientific technologies. Its curriculum included not only painting, calligraphy, sculpture and wheel throwing, but also physics, mathematics, chemistry and English. As a part of the graduation requirements, he conducted a project, i.e., a detailed survey of ceramic kilns in the major ceramic production areas in Japan. The Matsubayashi family archive still has his graduation thesis entitled Kynjshnj chihǀ tǀgyǀ kengakuki ό԰‫ֱچڠ‬ຯᄐߠ䝤ಖύʳ (Record of a Research Trip to the Ceramic Industry in Kynjshnj). This thesis presents dozens of illustrations of kilns with precise measurements. This survey made him one of the very few specialists in Japanese kiln construction. Matsubayashi had always been interested in studying abroad since he was in the Institute. After his graduation in 1921, his father put him in charge of a lawsuit against an electric power company. The Asahi-yaki kiln had experienced failures since the establishment of a hydroelectric power plant nearby. After a few years of research, he proved the relationship between the kiln failure and the vibration from the plant. Because the kiln received a large compensation, his father allowed him to study abroad. Matsubayashi chose England as his destination because he wanted to study not only the ceramic industry in England, but also art history at the University of Oxford. He departed from the Kobe Port on 26 July 1922, and arrived in London on 15 September.1

1

Passport of Matsubayashi Tsurunosuke, issued in 1922. Collection of Asahi-yaki Shiryǀkan.

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Leach Pottery in St Ives Bernard Leach was born in Hong Kong and lived in Japan for the first three years of his life. After returning to England in 1897, he studied at Slade School of Art and returned to Japan in 1909. While teaching etching, Leach met many young scholars and artists in Tokyo. In 1912, Leach and his friend Tomimoto Kenkichi ༄ ‫ ء‬ᖆ ‫ ٳ‬㻃 (1886-1963) apprenticed themselves to Ogata Kenzan VI ք‫ݮݠז‬೓՞㻃 and learned to produce ceramic wares. Leach later met Hamada Shǀji ᛍ‫ض‬᪾‫׹‬㻃(1894-1978), who was teaching at the Kyoto City Ceramic Research Institute and persuaded Hamada to help him establish a kiln in St Ives. Two years before Matsubayashi arrived in London, Bernard Leach and Hamada had established the Leach Pottery in St Ives. Hamada, Leach and his family arrived in England in 1920. Leach had a plan to start a pottery in partnership with Mrs Frances Horne, a founder of the St Ives Handicraft Guild. Their joint capital bought a strip of land bordering a stream on a hill outside St Ives. A cottage and a studio were built. Leach and Hamada constructed a climbing stoneware kiln, the first of its type to be built in the West. However, the kiln was not properly built and collapsed after the firing for Hamada’s second exhibition in November 1923 (Cardew 1988, 34). Unfortunate for Leach, Hamada did not have time to build another kiln. Hamada shortened his stay at St Ives because an earthquake devastated Tokyo where Hamada’s family lived. It is important to note that Hamada taught Matsubayashi at the Kyoto City Ceramic Research Institute. He helped Matsubayashi to come to England and introduced him to Leach. Knowing Matsubayashi’s experience and knowledge of kiln building, Hamada probably asked him to help the Leach Pottery.

Matsubayashi Tsurunosuke in St Ives In the first half of 1923, Matsubayashi spent most of his time in London and took a ceramic course at the Royal College of Art. In late 1923, he settled in the Leach Pottery. At that time, the Pottery had seven members: Bernard Leach, Hamada Shǀji, Edgar Skinner (Leach’s secretary), George Dan (helper), Matsubayashi, and Leach’s two students, Michael Cardew (1901-1983) and Katharine Pleydell-Bouverie (1895-1985) (Fig. 6-1). Cardew arrived at St Ives in the beginning of November 1923 when Hamada was about to leave and Matsubayashi was getting ready to build a new kiln. Cardew described Matsubayashi’s character:

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He was (I think) a graduate of the Kyoto Porcelain School and knew as much about the theoretical basis of ceramics as any Western ceramist of that time (probably more than most of them), and yet was also what used to be called among English tradesmen and artisans—and the description implied the highest praise—“a thoroughly practical man” (Cardew 1988, 35).

For about half a year, Matsubayashi generously shared his knowledge and experiences with the members of the Leach Pottery. His contributions are distinguishable in three aspects: firstly and most importantly, he built a three-chambered climbing kiln; secondly, he presented lectures to the members of the Pottery on the theory of ceramics; and thirdly, he gave Leach’s students practical training in ceramic making. Cardew commented his first experience in kiln building: By the time I got back to St Ives he [Matsubayashi] had already torn down the remains of the old kiln and had built a temporary one for firing special bricks for the new kiln. He immediately put me on to help him make firebricks, hammering the stiff crude local kaolin rock into wooden moulds (Ibid.).

The climbing kiln was completed sometime between February and April 1924. Except for the first few failures, the kiln worked efficiently. Leach later said: It is interesting to note that when the question arose of erecting a modern Western kiln in place of it, we were advised by one of the leading kiln designers in England not to do so, as its plan was excellent (Leach 1945, 186).

The front part of the kiln was modified as the fuel of the kiln was later changed from wood to raw petroleum. However, the kiln itself was in use until the early 1970s. Leach’s two students, Cardew and Pleydell-Bouverie, both commented Matsubayashi’s lectures on ceramic manufacture. They thought that the lecture topics seemed to include kiln construction, chemical formulae, and the plasticity of clay (Cardew 1988, 36; Pleydell-Bouverie 1960, 31). However, Pleydell-Bourverie was the only student who carefully took notes of the lectures. Cardew noticed: I regret to say that all this wealth was completely wasted on me at the time. And Bernard was almost as bad; he was always interrupting with philosophical questionings, such as whether all this theoretical stuff was really relevant to the quality of what you [Matsubayashi] produced (Cardew

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Chapter Six 1988, 36).

Nevertheless, we know that Pleydell-Bouverie’s notes later played a significant role, used not only by herself, but also by Leach and Cardew. For example, in a letter on 11 June 1926, she asked Leach to return her “little note-book on Matsu-chemistry and kiln-construction” (Pleydell-Bouverie 1926). In addition, Cardew mentioned many times in his writings that: In January 1945 I went back to Stoke again. This time I stopped on the way to visit Beano [Pleydell-Bouverie] at Coleshill, and to find out whether she still possessed her notes on Matsubayashi’s old pottery lectures of 1924. She produced them, and I copied them out (Cardew 1988, 155).

Furthermore, Matsubayashi gave Cardew and Pleydell-Bouverie basic training in ceramic making/manufacture. Cardew mentioned these in his notes: Besides being an amusing companion and making me work extremely hard at the brick making, he became my mentor and tutor during the following months, teaching me many useful if elementary things about pottery (Ibid., 35).

Pleydell-Bouverie even indicated that it was not Leach who gave them instructions: He [Leach] was a generous boss, never refusing information or advice when asked, but not in the least overbearing. His pupils, therefore, were free to develop along their own lines, and one learnt more by observation than by precept … Of direct instruction there was, I believe, not much; and it was Matsu, a complacent little man who rebuilt Bernard’s stoneware kiln and made splendid saggars and appalling pots (Pleydell-Bouverie 1980, 16-7).

Many of their later writings suggest that Matsubayashi tried to equip the Pottery and young potters with a sustainable production system. Without his support, the Leach Pottery would not have survived during its early years when it was full of difficulties. In April 1924, Matsubayashi left St. Ives and studied Latin and Greek in order to prepare for studying at Oxford. He claimed that he managed to gain a student status at Exeter College, University of Oxford. 2 After three months, he went back to London. Just before leaving England, Matsubayashi 

2



According to Brian Stewart, Keeper of the Archives, Exeter College, there was no record of anyone matriculated at Exeter College in 1924.

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donated a few works to the British Museum and the Victoria and Albert Museum. Made by himself at the Leach Pottery, each work bares two seals at the bottom: the Leach Pottery and the Asahi Pottery. 3 In September, he moved to Paris and studied paintings and sculptures at the Académie Colarossi. In December, he travelled through Europe and North Africa and returned to Japan in February 1925. The relationship between the Leach Pottery and Matsubayashi continued. In the Bernard Leach Archive at the Craft Study Centre in Surrey, there are a number of objects that Matsubayashi sent to St Ives after his departure. For instance, there are two long instructions entitled: “How to make the best clay” and “How to repair the Japanese wheel”. In addition, he sent ceramic tools from Japan. Leach’s letter dated 29 August 1927 begins as follows: 



I am ashamed that I did not answer at once to say that the potmill, water motor, lacquer, “funori” [ᕝᒫ] and brushes arrived safely (Leach 1927).

A photograph of a pot mill in Matsubayashi’s album, in fact, matches the pot mill which still survives in the Leach Pottery. After spending a few years in Kyoto, Matsubayashi moved to Aritato teach at the Saga Prefectural Ceramic Institute. While working hard to modernise the local ceramic industry, he continued his research on developing a method to produce artificial porcelain clay. However, he was affected by a sudden budget cut of the Institute caused by the change of government policy. On 2 July 1932, he left the Institute, and on 22 July, died unexpectedly, and the cause of the death was unknown. At that time, he was only 38 years old.

Legacy of Matsubayashi Tsurunosuke Matsubayashi stayed in St Ives less than a year, but contributed significantly to the early history of the Leach Pottery and the Studio Pottery Movement in Britain. The knowledge he provided was shared by over 100 graduates from the Leach Pottery. One of the most influential aspects was the climbing kiln. Suzuki Sadahiro states that many similar kilns were built by Leach’s students all over Britain (Suzuki 2006, 137-9). Besides the kiln, Pleydell-Bouverie and Cardew continued to use what they had learned from Matsubayashi. After staying there for a year, Pleydell-Bouverie left the 3

Matsubayashi donated a tea cup to the British Museum (1924, 1930.1) and a tea bowl to the Victoria and Albert Museum (c.1370-1924).

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Pottery. She built a kiln, which was designed by Matsubayashi, in Coleshill, Wales. At present day, she is recognised as one of the leading female potters in twentieth century Britain. As for Cardew, he left the Leach Pottery and established the Winchcombe Pottery in 1926. He later returned to Cornwall and established the Wenford Bridge Pottery in 1939. Today, he is famous for his careers in Ghana and Nigeria. In 1942, he accepted a position in the Colonial Service as a ceramist at Achimota College, an élite school for Africans in the Gold Coast. It was during his time in Ghana that he visited Pleydell-Bouverie and copied her little notebook of Matsubayashi’s lectures. In 1951, he was appointed by the Nigerian Government to the post of Pottery Officer in the Department of Commerce and Industry. He built and developed a successful pottery training centre at Abuja in northern Nigeria. The training he had received from Matsubayashi proved to be very useful for establishing potteries in Africa. In 1965, he returned to Wenford Bridge on his retirement. By the time, Cardew was acknowledged as one of the leading potters in Britain. Later he actively gave lectures and organised workshops for young ceramicists in many countries, including Italy, the United States and Australia. When he gave a lecture at the University of Michigan in 1980, he talked about his experience with Matsubayashi. I look around the pot shops in universities and I see a lot of very, very exciting equipment … When I see all those lovely facilities then, of course, I remember the old days starting with me in the year 1921 when we all, Bernard Leach, Hamada, Katherine Bouverie and myself, all encountered the most appalling obstacles and difficulties. Before we could even begin to make pots at all we had to make our own bricks. I remember the first job I did at St Ives. A very nice Japanese potter there, who had come to work when Hamada left, took me on to make bricks for his kiln; he was rebuilding the kiln. To make bricks, you had a mold and you hammered the rather hard, certainly not plastic, kaolin, the crude kaolin as dug out of the rock face, chunks of quarts and chunks of semi-decomposed feldspars and such, and you beat it into this mold. It was very hard work (Cardew 1980).

Through those activities of Cardew and Playdell-Bouverie, the knowledge of Japanese ceramic making which Matsubayashi introduced to the Leach Pottery, spread not only to Britain but also all over the world.

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Conclusion Matsubayashi has been regarded as a “kiln builder [who] came to St Ives especially for the Leach Pottery”, but this paper has disproved this view and revealed that the kiln was only a part of his legacy. This was probably not a simple misunderstanding caused by a limited surviving historical sources. It appears that Leach tended to avoid mentioning Matsubayashi in his writings. Revealing who he was and what he did for Leach and the Leach Pottery could jeopardise his fame as the founder of the Leach Legacy. This issue reflected in his words: “he [Matsubayashi] scored my ignorance” (Leach 1978, 149). Moreover, there was another reason why Matsubayashi’s contribution has not been freely discussed. As part of the Arts and Crafts Movement, the Leach Pottery advocated anti-industrial revolution. As a traditional potter and a ceramic engineer, Matsubayashi was closely related to the modernisation movement of the Japanese ceramic industry. Therefore, Leach might have wanted to hide the fact that he was actually benefited from the latest developments of the Japanese industry. Previous studies of modern Japanese ceramics always focused on ceramic works themselves and hardly ever discussed the transmission of the knowledge. Even if it was mentioned, the arguments tended to emphasise how the latest Western technology was introduced to Japan. Yet, this paper established the fact that by the early nineteenth century, Japan was one of the leading countries in the ceramic technology. The legacy which Matsubayashi left to the Pottery was fostered by Leach and more than 100 potters trained there, and later passed on to hundreds, if not thousands, of their students. Their creative works and activities worldwide prove global dissemination of the art of Japanese ceramic making.

Works Cited Primary Sources Cardew, M. 1980. Honorary Talk by Michael Cardew, Ann Arbor (typescript), Michael Cardew Archive in the Victoria and Albert Museum. —. 1988. A Pioneer Potter: An Autobiography. London: William Collins Sons & Co., Ltd. Leach, B. 1927. Letter to Matsubayashi Tsurunosuke, 29 August 1927. The collection of Asahi-yaki Shiryǀkan ཛֲ䴻ᇷறᙴˁ㻃 —. 1945. A Potter’s Book. London: Faber and Faber.

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—. 1978. Beyond East and West: Memoirs, Portraits and Essays. London: Faber and Faber. Pleydell-Bouverie, K. 1926. Letter to Bernard Leach, 11 June 1926. Craft Study Centre, Barnard Leach Archive, BL2420. —. 1960. At St Ives in the Early Years. In Essays in Appreciation, Barrow, T., 31. Wellington: Editorial Committee of the New Zealand Potter. —. 1980. A Chance Account. In Katharine Playdell-Bouverie, ed. Crafts Study Centre and Holburne Museum, 16-7. Bath: University of Bath.

Secondary Sources Cooper, E. 2003. Bernard Leach, Life & Work. New Haven: Yale University Press. Suzuki S. ርֵጜ‫ ݛ‬2006. Bernard Leach no shǀgai to geijutsu 垑垹型垹 垊垸垫垹垂圸‫س‬ෑ圲ड़๬ˁʳTokyo: Minerva Shobǀ. Whybrow, M. 1996. The Leach Legacy: St Ives Pottery and its Influence. Bristol: Sansom & Co.

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Fig. 6-1. Photograph taken in St Ives in 1923. From left: Hamada Shǀji, Bernard Leach, Armorel Nance or Katherine Pleydell-Bouverie, Matsubayashi Tsurunosuke, Muriel Leach. The collection of Asahi-yaki Shiryokan ཛֲ䴻ᇷறᙴ.

PART III FABRICATING THE OTHER

CHAPTER SEVEN INTENDED TO DECEIVE: ILLUSIONISTIC PAINTING AT THE EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY CHINESE COURT KRISTINA KLEUTGHEN

Introduction Nothing within the Forbidden City prepares visitors for the stunning garden scene inside its Studio of Exhaustion from Diligent Service (Juanqin zhaiʳ ଐႧសʼ (Fig. 7-1), also known as the Retirement Studio. A tall speckled bamboo fence that surrounds the viewer opens into a moongate, beyond which walk two red-crowned cranes while magpies flit overhead. A large two-story building sits nearby, with the yellow roof tiles, red walls, and gilded decorations emblematic of an imperial residence. Lush peonies, roses and magnolias bloom below grand pines and cypresses while distant mountains provide a backdrop to a waterfall that empties into a pond. The lattice fence that surrounds the viewer supports an overhead trellis thickly twined with the leafy green vines and lush purple blossoms of wisteria, through which a bright blue sky can be glimpsed. Below the trellis is a miniature theater just over four meters high with a yellow-tiled roof capped by a large gold finial. A second small, uncovered stage platform sits directly between the theater and a large cushioned seat with a perfect center view of the stage. This idyllic, luxuriant spring garden setting creates the perfect environment in which a retired emperor can restore himself after a lifetime of diligent governing. While the theater is real, the garden is a deception: it is merely a group of illusionistic paintings installed seamlessly across the walls and ceilings of a building. Known as tongjing hua ຏན྽ or “paintings that connect scenes”, these works were created in the 1770s by a group of European and Chinese artists serving the Qianlong ೓ၼ Emperor (r. 1736-1795). Using

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imported linear perspective, foreshortening and shading to create an impression of reality, this type of illusionistic painting is unique in the history of Chinese art for the way it blurs the line between reality and illusion in an all-encompassing visual program.

The Technical and Conceptual Foundations of tongjing hua Everything about tongjing hua directly challenges orthodox Chinese painting theories and aesthetics, which championed the loftiness of abstracted “spirit resonance” (qiyun ௛ᣉ) expressed by scholar-amateur painters over the accurate representational realism achieved by trained professional artists. The defiance of tradition in tongjing hua raises many questions, but none more pressing than the motivations behind their intentional deceptions. Despite the vast scholarship on Chinese painting, tongjing hua remain largely unknown and unstudied. Recovering the biography of these paintings adds a significant chapter to the history of Chinese art and reveals new implications about Sino-European artistic exchange at the eighteenth-century imperial court. Throughout Chinese painting history, pictorial realism was typically derided as technical trickery rather than true art. The untrained literati painter who painted abstractly for the sake of self-expression was considered vastly superior to the trained professional who painted subjects as if they were real in exchange for money. However, examples of illusionistic realism for the sake of intentional deception do exist in Chinese painting history. The artist Cao Buxing ඦլᘋ (act. third century) painted a fly that King Sun Quan ୪ᦞ (182-252, r. 229-252) attempted to brush it off the white silk of the painting (Acker 1974, 19). Xun Xu ಃට (?-289) chose to repay a practical joke by painting the jokester’s new house with such a convincing portrait of the man’s deceased grandfather that the man and his siblings abandoned the house in shock (Ibid., 28). To please King Cao Rui ඦⷠ (r. 226-239), Xu Mao ஊ᠓ (act. mid-third century) painted a perch so true to life that it fooled a raft of rare white otters into being captured for the ruler (Ibid., 18). However, the illusionism that flourished during the third century is an anomaly in Chinese painting history. The knowledge and practice of those techniques was lost to history long before the eighteenth century. In the intervening centuries, the most influential artists rejected pictorial realism on both aesthetic and symbolic grounds, impacting both the history and historiography of Chinese painting. Tongjing hua were inspired by European large-scale pictorial illusionism.

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The famous competition between the painters Zeuxis (act. 435-390 BC) and Parrhasios (act. 440-390 BC) for the most convincing painted illusion had evolved through the Renaissance revival of early architectonic illusionism and formal development of mathematically based linear perspective into quadratura (Sjöström 1978, 11). 1 These massive Renaissance and Baroque paintings on walls and ceilings use three-dimensional pictorial techniques and are composed around the real surrounding and supporting architecture, producing visions of infinite space on two-dimensional planes (Ibid., 11-2; Ebert-Schifferer 2002, 22). Italian artists such as the partnership of Michelangelo Colonna (1604-1687) and Agostino Mitelli (1609-1660), and the Jesuit Andrea Pozzo (1642-1709) dominated the practice of creating this contiguity between the real and painted architectural spaces. During the height of illusionistic painting in Europe, the Italian Jesuit lay brother and professional painter Giovanni Gherardini (1655-1723) joined the French Jesuit mission to the Qing (1644-1911) court in Beijing. A student of quadratura masters Colonna and Mitelli, Gherardini arrived in Beijing in 1699 and spent the next few years painting for the Kangxi ൈዺ Emperor (r. 1661-1722), training Chinese court artists in perspective techniques, and painting quadratura on the walls and ceilings of the French Jesuit Church in Beijing (Beitang ‫ק‬ഘ). But dissatisfied with the strict Jesuit life, he quit Beijing in 1704 leaving little evidence of his time there (Corsi 2004, 27-33). 2 Gherardini’s subtle effect at the Chinese court was far outstripped by the 1715 arrival of another Jesuit lay brother, Giuseppe Castiglione (1688-1766). Known by the Chinese name Lang Shining ૴‫׈‬ኑ, Castiglione would serve the powerful Kangxi, Yongzheng ሸ‫( إ‬r. 1723-1735) and Qianlong Emperors in succession as a favoured retainer and master painter. His skill with the European pictorial techniques of linear perspective, foreshortening and chiaroscuro was put to use in hundreds of paintings, particularly during the Qianlong era. Castiglione claimed to be a follower of the Jesuit master quadraturisti Andrea Pozzo, and sometime before the 1730s painted quadratura inside two of the other Jesuit churches in Beijing. 3 Although 









1



The word quadratura derives from the grid created by the artists to transfer their sketches and cartoons onto the real surfaces with the correct distortion required to create the illusions. 2 Oddly, if Gherardini had a Chinese name, it has not survived in any records. Only two known works are ascribed to his studio: Portrait of Emperor Kangxi Reading and Gentlewomen Under a Phoenix Tree (both c. early eighteenth century, Palace Museum, Beijing). 3 These were the East Church (Dongtang ࣟഘ), painted with episodes from the life of emperor Constantine I on its north and south walls, and the South Church

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127

none of the original churches have survived, Chinese and Korean visitors during the period recorded their astonishment at their own deception in the face of these supremely lifelike paintings. Despite the third century evidence to the contrary, these well-educated viewers regularly noted that East Asian painting did not have this tradition of realism and visual deception (Ishida 1960, 102-3; Shin 2006, 23; Lee 2006, 52-3). Castiglione adapted quadratura to the Chinese imperial context for the Qianlong Emperor by making two significant changes. First, the imperially sponsored works were not painted on walls like the quadratura in the churches, but were instead executed in a traditional Chinese format known as tieluo hua ၀ᆵ྽ (literally, “apply-and-remove” paintings). 4 In contrast to the scroll paintings common throughout East Asia, tieluo are not strengthened with brocade mountings and rollers, nor do they spend their lives in protective storage punctuated by occasional brief viewing sessions. Tieluo-format paintings are executed on paper or silk before being adhered directly to wall surfaces and displayed continuously until replaced with new paintings or moved to another location as desired. When executed with linear perspective, foreshortening, and shading in life-size formats, tieluo-format paintings became their own genre of tongjing hua: paintings that offered viewers the illusion of being able to step into the depicted scene. The second major change was an acquiescence to the Qianlong Emperor’s personal aesthetic against shadows. The emperor read the cast shadows and chiaroscuro that granted three-dimensionality in European paintings as soiled painting surfaces and figures with dirty faces. Castiglione replaced light and shadow with light and highlight, creating scenes and figures suffused with midday sunshine without sacrificing consistent light sources or the mass and volume of the subjects. While cast shadows are not part of traditional Chinese painting, the fresh noontime brightness of tongjing hua is enhanced by the materials with which they were created: the top-quality silk and mineral pigments not only create luminous surfaces but also reflect the genre’s lavish imperial patronage. Although Castiglione is the architect behind the genre of tongjing hua, he was not solely responsible for creating the individual works. Imperial records demonstrate that tongjing hua were created collaboratively by the 



(Nantang তഘ), painted with a false dome on the ceiling as well as false architecture and rooms on all four walls. For descriptions, see Ishida 1960, 101. 4 Nie Hui argues that the term evolved directly from the separate verbs tie ၀ “apply” and luo ᆵ “remove” into a two-character noun connoting the actual removable painting pasted onto the wall. See Nie 2006, 86-7.

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artists assigned to a special branch of the imperial painting academy known as the Wish-Fulfilling Studio (Ruyi guan ‫ڕ‬რᙴ). The Wish-Fulfilling Studio included the men that the Qianlong Emperor considered to be his best court painters, both Chinese and European. Several of the Chinese court artists involved in painting these works have retained their period fame, such as Jin Tingbiao ८‫ݪ‬ᑑ (act. mid-eighteenth century), Ding Guanpeng ԭ ᨠ ᣛ (fl. c. 1738-1768), and Yao Wenhan ৔ ֮ ᡤ (act. eighteenth century). The European artists were all missionaries who served the court with the hope of converting the emperor: Jean-Denis Attiret, S.J. (1702-1768, known as Wang Zhicheng ‫׆‬ીᇨ), Ignatius Sichelbarth, S.J. (1708-1780, known as Ai Qimeng ‫ۦ‬ඔ፞), Jean-Damascène Salusti, O.E.S (d. 1781, known as An Deyi ‫ڜ‬൓რ), Giuseppe Panzi, S.J. (1734-before 1812, known as Pan Tingzhang ᑰ ‫ ݪ‬ᑾ ), and Louis de Poirot, S.J. (1735-1813, known as He Qingtai ၅෎௠). But the artists who were far more consistently active in creating tongjing hua are those whom Chinese art history has overlooked. Although these painters have not left many signed examples of their work, the imperial archives record their busy and dedicated service. 5 Two repeated names stand out in particular: Wang Youxue ‫ؔ׆‬ᖂ (act. 1730s-1780s) and Yi Lantai ْ ᥞ ௠ (act. 1750s-1790s). Both of these men worked with Castiglione for many years before his death, first as his students and later as his colleagues in the Wish-Fulfilling Studio. Wang Youxue seems to have been the most knowledgeable and talented student produced by Castiglione’s training, even compared with the other European painters. He was one of the few Chinese artists approved to use Castiglione’s European techniques without supervision even before Castiglione’s death in 1766, and continued using them well into the twilight years of the Qianlong reign. 6 Tongjing hua are exclusive to the eighteenth-century imperial court, and records document that they were mounted in all of Qianlong’s favourite and most frequently-used sites in and around the capital. In addition to the Forbidden City, any paintings were housed in the magnificent Yuanming yuan ႽࣔႼ imperial garden complex in the northwest of the city. 7 They 









5 The documents are found in the Ruyi guan sections of the Official Qing Records of the Activities of the Bureaus and Workshops under the Palace Board of Works (Zaobanchu gezuo hezuo huoji qingdang), hereafter abbreviated RYG. 6 RYG QL3/6/15 (31 July 1738). 7 For example, paintings were mounted in the “Magnanimous World” (Tantan dangdang ࡖࡖᘒᘒ), “Honoring Three Selflessnesses Court” (Fengsanwusi dian

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129

were also installed in other imperial gardens and parks around the capital, such as the Fragrant Mountain (Xiangshan ଉ՞) residence, the imperial Central and South Seas park (Zhongnanhai խ ত ௧ ) just west of the Forbidden City, and the Empress Dowager’s residence in the Southern-style Garden of Carefree Spring (Changchun yuan ዃ ਞ Ⴜ ). 8 Mount Pan (Panshan ᒌ՞), one of the “traveling palaces” (xinggong ۩୰) that housed the emperor when traveling outside the capital, also boasted a complete wall-and-ceiling set of paintings installed similarly to the set within the Retirement Studio. 9 Tongjing hua were even installed at the official imperial summer residence, the Mountain Retreat for Escaping Summer Heat (Bishu shanzhuang ᝩཔ՞๗), located 250 kilometers north of the capital and outside the Great Wall (Wanli changcheng ᆄ ߺ ९ ৄ ) at Chengde. 10 Composed to seamlessly cover the walls and even the ceilings of imperial structures, tongjing hua average two to three meters in height and two to six meters in length. The invisible European-style brushwork in these paintings is meant to disappear, erasing both the material process of creation and the artist’s hand to focus the viewer’s attention on the scene and its contiguity with reality. These two characteristics contribute to the most significant feature of a tongjing hua: how it reshapes the viewer’s perception of space and reality by integrating the surrounding architecture and eliminating the supporting surface. The perspectival painting techniques used in these works destroy the surfaces on which they are mounted, implying that the surrounding architecture is more spacious than in reality. In order to make this implication, the paintings always incorporate the nearby architecture and distinctive decorative features. For example, in the Retirement Studio, the viewer is centered between a real bamboo moongate and a painted bamboo moongate that flow seamlessly into one another. The compositions are tailored to the precise dimensions of the structure in which they are to be mounted, and the compositions flow 









࡚Կྤߏᄥʼ, and “Immortals’ Terrace” (Pengdao yao tai ᓒ୾ጄፕ). See RYG QL13/8/2 (24 September 1748), RYG QL11/8/26 (10 October 1746), and RYG QL25/5/20 (2 July 1760), respectively. 8 RYG QL11/1/19 (9 February 1746) for Xiangshan; QL14/4/11 (26 May 1749) for Panshan; QL19/6/5 (24 July 1754) for Zhongnanhai; QL2/6/24 (21 July 1737) for Changchun yuan. 9 RYG QL15/8/1 (1 September 1750). These paintings were commissioned in 1750 after other illusionistic paintings installed in the Pavilion for Attracting Victory (Jingsheng xuan ֧໏ನ). 10 RYG QL18/7/26 (24 August 1753).

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around windows and doorways to replace their supporting surfaces with the painted scene. These two elements, integration and elimination, remove the materiality of both the painting and the architecture to imply that what the viewer sees is a real space in which he can spend time. All surviving examples of tongjing hua date from the Qianlong era. 11 The emperor commissioned these works throughout the length of his reign, beginning in 1736 during his first year on the throne when he requested them for the imperial apartments and office suite in the Hall of Mental Cultivation (Yangxin dian ᕆ֨ᄥ) at the nerve center of the Forbidden City. 12 But most of the extant tongjing hua still in situ are found within the Forbidden City’s Qianlong Garden, located within Qianlong’s retirement compound known as the Palace of Tranquil Longevity (Ningshou gong ኑ ኂ୰). 13 This garden houses the spectacular Retirement Studio, which is the only complete wall-and-ceiling program of tongjing hua to have survived. 











Painting the Retirement Studio Construction on the Retirement Studio began in 1771 and was completed in 1773, but the paintings were created afterward between 1774 and 1779. The Retirement Studio was a re-creation of one of Qianlong’s favourite sites, the Studio of Respectful Victory (Jingsheng zhai ᄃ໏ស) in the Palace of Established Happiness (Jianfu gong ৬ጝ୰), located in the northwest section of the Forbidden City. Qianlong made this connection clear in a poem on the Retirement Studio: “Built in the style of the earlier Studio of Respectful Victory, I have chosen the Studio of Exhaustion from Diligent Service for my future retirement” (Nie 2008, 237). 14 The paintings in the Retirement Studio are therefore believed to be reproductions of ones 

11



However, commissions for these paintings appear in the imperial archives for the Palace Board of Works (Zaoban chu ທᙄ๠) as early as the 1720s during the Yongzheng reign. Although perspectival painting was sporadically used at the Qing court for repairs and minor decoration through the nineteenth century, true tongjing hua ended with the Qianlong reign. 12 RYG QL1/2/5 (16 March 1736) and QL1/6/29 (6 August 1736). Although no artist is mentioned in the first document, the second specifically requests Castiglione as the painter. 13 In addition to the paintings in the Retirement Studio, three more paintings are found inside the Pure Jade Pavilion (Yucui xuan ‫⩙د‬ನ) and the Retreat for Cultivating Harmony (Yanghejing she ᕆࡉጲॐ). 14 Jingsheng yi qian shi, Juanqin bu hou ju ᄃ໏ࠉছ‫ڤ‬ʿʳଐႧԽ‫ࡺٿ‬ˁ

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131

Castiglione created for the Studio of Respectful Victory in 1742, which themselves were created after other works that already existed in the Yuanming yuan. 15 Although no artists’ signatures have ever been found on the Retirement Studio paintings, the Imperial Household archives for the Wish-Fulfillment Studio record the commission as given to Wang Youxue on 22 March 1774. 16 Despite this, and records documenting that Wang Youxue frequently painted Castiglione’s compositions, the question of whether Castiglione’s hand is found in the paintings has been hotly debated. Although Castiglione died eight years before the Studio paintings were begun, some scholars have steadfastly maintained that only the Italian was skilled enough to create the effects of these paintings. 17 The Retirement Studio works rely heavily on traditional symbols to articulate hidden wishes for the Qianlong Emperor’s longevity and legacy. For example, the wisteria that covers the ceiling symbolizes an unbroken line and many generations of offspring, based on the blossoms formed of multiple petals on single stems (Wang 2007, 284). The peonies (or fuguihua ༄၆क़) in direct sight of the viewer behind the moongate are springtime symbols of nobility, success, wealth and abundance as well as the yang ၺʳ energy of masculinity (Williams 1976, 320-1). 18 Peonies together with the white magnolias seen on the west wall of the Retirement Studio are a particularly potent auspicious symbol meaning “jade hall of wealth and honor” (yutang fugui ‫د‬ഘ༄၆) (Welch 2008, 36). Wisteria, peonies and magnolia all bloom in the spring, a time of vigour and strength that belies the fact that Qianlong was in the autumn of his life. It is possible that the spring season in the Retirement Studio is also a reference to the emperor’s personal style name (hao ᇆ) “Eternal Spring Scholar” (Changchun jushi ९ ਞࡺՓ), granted in his youth as immortal suggestion of youthful literati energy. Powerful traditional symbols of longevity are found in the long-lived evergreen pines and cypresses in the paintings, whose individual symbolic strength is enhanced by their mutual presence. The words for pine (song ࣪) and cypress (bai ਹ) together create a rebus for the wish “as long a life as the pine and the cypress” (songbai changshou ࣪ਹ९ኂ) (Ibid.). Cranes, believed to live for centuries and therefore also symbolizing longevity, further emphasize this wish for a long life. Pines and cranes shown together create the auspicious wish “live as long as pine and crane” (songling heshou 











15



RYG QL7/5/25 (27 June 1742) and QL7/6/2 (3 July 1742). RYG QL39/2/21 (March 31, 1774). 17 This argument is championed by Nie Chongzheng. 18 Peonies are also known in Chinese as wanghua ઄क़ (“king of flowers”). 16

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࣪ ᤿ ᦊ ኂ ) (Welch 2008, 69). The emperor might style himself a perpetually youthful scholar, but these repetitive intertwined wishes for longevity and legacy demonstrate more than a little anxiety about the possibilities of old age and retirement. When defined beyond their superficial surface identities as the contents of a garden and distant landscape, the florae and faunae in these paintings express a clear and auspicious message for the emperor to live a long, healthy, happy life with many offspring. One might argue, therefore, that these paintings are no different from any other Chinese painting with the same symbolic content that is executed with the traditional calligraphic brushwork and stylised forms. Pines and cranes are established Chinese symbols of longevity whether they are depicted with hyperrealism or abstracted inkstrokes. But the fact that these symbols are painted within a garden bounded by the distinctive red Forbidden City walls in the tongjing hua panels implies that these omens were intended to be read as tangibly present in the Qianlong Garden of the retirement compound. The perspectival techniques and life-size renderings in these paintings that make their supporting surfaces invisible demonstrate that the works were not created for merely for decoration, but rather to offer the possibility that their subjects were authentic elements of the emperor’s reality. Of course, the inescapable reality was that these scenes were simply flat paintings. How, then, did the Qianlong Emperor react to this realisation? What could the imported European painting techniques do for the emperor that traditional Chinese painting could not?

Intended to Deceive Many tongjing hua were originally mounted in the “European Palaces” (Xiyang lou ۫੉ᑔ) section of the Yuanming yuan imperial gardens. Set in a dramatic landscape, a group of pleasure palaces and fountains were designed by Castiglione and built in bronze and marble with a combination of European and Chinese design elements. Although the site is now in ruins, records demonstrate that tongjing hua were originally found inside the structures during the eighteenth century (Pirazzoli-t’Serstevens 2001). However, a series of engravings titled Pictures of the European Palaces and Waterworks (Xiyang lou shuifa tu ۫੉ᑔֽऄቹ) designed by Yi Lantai in the early 1780s also records an unusual outdoor use of tongjing hua, as well as how they were intended to be viewed and understood. The twentieth print in the series (Fig. 7-2) depicts what appears to be a European street located at the far eastern end of the European Palaces.

Intended to Deceive

133

Reconstructions of distant sites and structures were not unusual for Qianlong Emperor: the Yuanming yuan included a number of replicas, including famous poetic sites from southern China, Tibetan Buddhist temples in Beijing, even large open grassland spaces from the northern steppes used for drill fields. Qianlong had even created a personal shopping street like those in Suzhou and staffed it with eunuchs and servants playing the roles of shopkeepers, passersby and even pickpockets so the emperor could taste life as a regular citizen. But rather than construct a “real” European street in the European Palaces section, the emperor had it created with tongjing hua hung on parallel stone screens to create a long perspectival view into an infinitely unachievable Western distance. Although the screens and the paintings have all been lost, proof of their existence remains in the caption on the engraving of the scene. This brief text identifies the view: it presents not as a European street but as “perspective paintings east of the lake” (hudong xianfa hua ྋࣟᒵऄ྽). By labeling the scene as “perspective paintings,” Qianlong demonstrated that the method of creating the illusion was more valuable to him than a tangible simulacrum. Specifically, this caption demonstrates that the emperor believed the perspectival techniques that created the illusion of Europe were the most significant features of this site. The surprise this disjunction is meant to evoke by breaking the illusion reveals how the viewer was intended to react. As demonstrated by the caption and its subtle position in the top left corner of the print, the uninformed viewer would first have been astonished at the foreign scene, then at his discovery of the scene as a flat painting in an unknown style, and finally at his own misperception of reality. Like the competition between Zeuxis and Parrhasios, the triumph of these paintings is in their unmasking and the viewer’s realization of how he has been deceived. Who, then, was the emperor truly attempting to deceive with these works? Only himself, and therefore no one at all. The false European street scene implies that the viewer’s surprise and wonder at discovering the true nature of tonging hua was paramount. By clearly identifying that scene as a group of paintings rather than a group of buildings—which could easily have been accomplished—the significance of the illusion and of its discovery is made clear. The feeling of marvel and wonder at discovering the view was painted, rather than built, trumped even the content of the scene. This demonstrates that the realisation of the deception perpetrated by tongjing hua was the most valuable part of the viewing experience. The paintings are intended to deceive the viewer only insofar as they make him marvel at both the possibility that scene could have been real and his own initial mistaken response.

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By commissioning tongjing hua for his many residences, Qianlong clearly pronounced his enjoyment of the sensations he experienced when (re)discovering how perspectival techniques could recreate the effects of real human vision. The emperor’s repeated willingness to suspend certain reality and accept a fantastic alternative is crucial to understanding how much pleasure he derived from these works. Only the first time he encountered a tongjing hua might he be truly deceived, but even with this knowledge he could continue to enjoy the sensations incited by this deception. It is this sense of intelligent wonder and surprise with which the Wish-Fulfilling Studio artists repeatedly engaged in creating tongjing hua, proving the emperor’s full consciousness and appreciation of these artistic fictions and perfected realities. Auspicious longevity cranes strolling outside the Retirement Studio predict a long, healthy life, and the unexplored mysteries of distant Europe are located just at the end of the garden rather than across an ocean. No clouds darken the skies, no shadows mar the ground, and all manner of auspicious objects are present in this world that seems contiguous with the viewer’s reality. What the European techniques offered therefore were opportunities to expand the possibilities of the emperor’s perceivable reality because the objects in the paintings appeared just as they should to the human eye. By eliminating the supporting surfaces and integrating real features from the surrounding architecture and landscape, the illusionistic techniques used in tongjing hua offered the viewer the possibility of stepping into the scene. The viewer could unquestionably inhabit the space he saw and interact with what was in it because the space and its contents looked real. Because illusionistic paintings depict objects as they appear to the naked eye, even with the foreknowledge that the view is a painting, the viewer still enjoys a fleeting moment of hesitation before confirming the scene was merely an illusion. Yet it cannot be understated: while the technical basis for these works is European, these paintings are uniquely and completely Chinese. The subject matter never adopts either European content or symbolism, nor does the use of linear perspective in tongjing hua carry any European metaphors. The imported techniques are simply representational technologies put to use in an assertive and self-possessed adaptation to innovate a new kind of painting that is distinctly eighteenth-century Chinese. Despite their popularity during Qianlong’s reign, there are barely a dozen tongjing hua surviving today. 19 The others were likely lost or 

19



In addition to the Retirement Studio paintings and the visual evidence for those in the “European Palaces”, there are seven other single tongjing hua known to exist. It is also entirely possible, and very likely, that more works do exist but remain

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destroyed, perhaps consumed by the many fires that plagued the Forbidden City and the Yuanming yuan. 20 All tongjing hua are extremely vulnerable to damage because they were—or in some cases, still are—on permanent display, their large surface areas exposed to the drastic changes of Beijing’s harsh climate and polluted environment for long periods of time. The Retirement Studio paintings and the handful of others still found in the Qianlong Garden have survived purely by circumstance: Qianlong personally decreed that the Tranquil Longevity retirement compound could only house retired emperors (taishang huang ֜Ղ઄)—of which he was the only one. Most prosaically, the skills necessary to create tongjing hua died out with the Wish-Fulfilling Studio painters and were not continued at court into the nineteenth century. Nevertheless, the extant works and imperial records together bear unassailable witness to the widespread presence of tongjing hua throughout the imperial court environment during the eighteenth century, and therefore to their presence in Chinese art history as well. The truth produced by encountering these painted illusions, whether in the eighteenth or twenty-first centuries, testifies to the true marvel of the reality that contains these infinitely pleasurable deceptions. 



Works Cited Primary Sources Acker, William R.B., 1974. Some T’ang and Pre-T’ang texts on Chinese Painting, Vol. 2. Leiden: E.J. Brill. Official Qing Records of the Activities of the Bureaus and Workshops under the Palace Board of Works (Zaobanchu gezuo hezuo huoji qingdang ທ ᙄ๠ଡ‫ګ܂‬೚੒ૠ෎ᚾ). National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan and Palace Museum, Beijing.

Secondary Sources Corsi, Elisabetta. 2004. La Fábrica de las Ilusiones: Los Jesuitas y la Difusión de la Perspectiva Lineal en China, 1698-1766. Mexico: El Colegio de México. unknown and unstudied because of the practical difficulties in handling paintings as large as these that prevents them from being conserved, exhibited, and published. 20 Any tongjing hua still mounted in the Yuanming yuan gardens in 1860 would likely have been looted or destroyed.

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Ebert-Schifferer, Sybille. 2002. Deceptions and Illusions: Five Centuries of Trompe l’Oeil Painting. Washington: National Gallery of Art. Ishida, Mikinosuke. 1960. A Biographical Study of Giuseppe Castiglione (Lang Shih-ning), a Jesuit Painter in the Court of Peking under the Ch’ing Dynasty. Memoirs of the Research Department of the Toyo Bunko 19: 79-121. Kleutghen, Kristina. 2010. The Emperor’s Perspective: Picturing the Qianlong Emperor’s (r. 1736-1795) Private Life. Ph.D. diss., Harvard University. Lee, Hyung-dae. 2006. Hong Dae-yong’s Beijing Travels and His Changing Perception of the West—Focusing on Eulbyeong yeonhaengnok and Uisan Mundap. The Review of Korean Studies 9, 4: 46-62. Nie, Chongzheng ៮ ശ ‫ إ‬. 2008. Gugong Juanqinzhai tianding hua, quanjing hua shen jiu ਚ୰ଐႧស֚ື྽ʿʳ ٤ན྽෡ߒ. In Qing gong huihua yu xihua dongjianʳ ෎୰ᢄ྽Պ۫྽ࣟዬ, 232-47. Beijing: Zijincheng chubanshe. Nie, Hui ៮ẹ. 2006. Tieluo hua ji qi zai Qing dai gongting jianzhu zhong de shiyong ၀ᆵ྽֗ࠡ‫ڇ‬෎‫ז‬୰‫ݪ‬৬ᗰխऱࠌ‫ش‬. Wenwu ֮ढʳ 11: 86-94. Pirazzoli-t’Serstevens, Michèle. 2001. Europeomania at the Chinese Court: The Palace of the Delights of Harmony (1747 and 1751), Architecture and Interior Decoration. Transactions of the Oriental Ceramic Society 65: 47-60. Shin, Ik-Cheol. 2006. The Experiences of Visiting Catholic Churches in Beijing and the Recognition of Western Learning Reflected in the Journals of Travel to Beijing. The Review of Korean Studies 9, 4: 11-31. Sjöström, Ingrid. 1978. Quadratura: Studies in Italian Ceiling Painting. Stockholm: Almqvuist and Wiksell International. Wang, Zilin ‫׆‬՗ࣥ. 2007. Zijincheng yuan zhuang yu yuan chuang࿫ᆃ ৄ଺ᇘፖ଺໌. Beijing: Zijincheng chubanshe. Welch, Patricia Bjaaland, 2008. Chinese Art: A Guide to Motifs and Visual Imagery. North Clarendon, VT: Tuttle Publishing. Williams, C.A.S., 1976. Outlines of Chinese Symbolism and Art Motives, third edition. New York: Dover Publications.

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Fig. 7-1. Wang Youxue and other court painters, Studio of Exhaustion from Diligent Service (Juanqin zhai ଐႧស), 1774-9. Tongjing hua, mineral pigments on silk, various sizes. Palace Museum, Beijing.

Fig. 7-2. Ilantai, Perspective Paintings East of the Lake (Hudong xianfa hua ྋࣟᒵ ऄ྽), Plate 20 from Pictures of the European Palaces and Fountains (Xiyang lou shuifa tu ۫੉ᑔֽऄቹ) (1781-6). Series of twenty copperplate engravings, each approximately 87 x 51cm. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

CHAPTER EIGHT THE COLLECTING OF FAMILLE NOIRE PORCELAIN IN THE WEST: THE PROBLEM WITH AUTHENTICITY OF LARGE SCALE FAMILLE NOIRE VASES 1 

KONSTANZE AMELIE KNITTLER

The collecting of Famille Noire porcelain had become a popular activity in the West from the mid-nineteenth century onwards, and this particular type of porcelain was a major component of both British and American collections that were formed in the late nineteenth century. This paper therefore discusses the reception of Famille Noire porcelain in the West, with regard to questions on authenticity and its development of prices in the British and American art markets. Famille Noire can generally be described as a sub-group of Famille Verte, which developed from the five-colour (wucai ն൑) palette in the late Ming dynasty (1368-1644 AD). The term Famille Verte was coined by the French ceramic collector Albert Jacquemart (1808-1875) in 1862. Although the related term Famille Noire was not actually used by Jacquemart himself, it can certainly be referred back to him, as he included “black in light touches, rarely laid on thickly” in his description of Famille Verte wares (Jacquemart 1873). The actual expression “Famille Noire” was first mentioned by Frederick Litchfield in 1900 (Litchfield 1900, 113). Famille Noire can generally be defined as bearing a copper-green lead-based enamel 1

The research on Famille Noire porcelain was strongly supported by my former tutor Gordon Lang (1943-2010), an outstanding expert on ceramics. I am further indebted to Beth McKillop and Luisa Mengoni from the Victoria and Albert Museum for taking their time to locate and look at objects in detail. I am most grateful to Prof. George Wheeler of Columbia University who informed me about the scientific project on Famille Noire in the United States, and I would equally like to thank Prof. Norman Weiss who updated me on the project and its current status. For a further discussion on Famille Noire porcelain, see Knittler 2011b.

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over an unfired coating of Chinese cobalt “émail sur biscuit” (on the biscuit). During enamel firing, the two combined to give an intensely black effect, with a hint of green. The technique was first used at the imperial ceramic kilns in Jingdezhen in the mid-fifteenth century, but disappeared again until the late seventeenth century when it was taken up once more at the court of the Kangxi ൈዺ emperor (r. 1662-1722) (Wood 1998, 235-8). During the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, large scale wares of Famille Noire were generally regarded as Kangxi period pieces. Owing to the circumstance that a considerable number of objects of the Kangxi period bear a Chenghua ‫( ֏ګ‬r. 1465-1487) reign mark on the base, many pieces of Famille Noire had even been mistaken as late Ming at the time. Only in the second half of the twentieth century the theory was shaped that large scale pieces with a black ground were an invention of the (late) nineteenth century. The significance of Famille Noire for an academic study can therefore be explained by the recurring questioning of their authenticity.

The First Doubt The first publication to express profound scepticism towards the authenticity of Famille Noire large scale vases was John Alexander Pope’s catalogue of the Chinese porcelains in the Frick collection in New York (Pope 1974, 87-90). It was Pope’s belief that none of the large vases featured in the collection was earlier than the nineteenth century. He supported his theory with various examples of serious collectors of Chinese porcelain, who mainly bought in East Asia and did not possess any of those pieces, such as Charles Lang Freer (1854-1919) and Alfred Hippisley (1848-1939). Apart from a stylistic analysis that led Pope to believe that these pieces were fakes, he mentioned the inventory of Augustus the Strong’s collection in Dresden of 1779, which listed five small cups and saucers with black enamel decoration, which seemed to be genuine Kangxi porcelain. To further support his theory, Pope referred to the National Palace Museum in Taiwan which had never seen an example of a large scale Famille Noire vase before it was presented with one piece in 1950.2 Pope very much expressed his regret about the uncertainty that surrounded the Famille Noire large scale type. In his discussion of the Lady Lever Art Gallery’s Chinese collection in Port Sunlight near Liverpool, Oliver Impey 2

However, Pope’s account cannot be strictly accurate, as the National Palace Museum in Taiwan only opened in 1965.

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went even further in stating that no documentary evidence has yet been found for the Kangxi period of Famille Noire, in contrast to those of the Yongzheng ሸ‫( إ‬r. 1723-1735) and Qianlong ೓ၼ (r. 1736-1795) periods, where pieces were documented (Impey 1992, 235-6).

Famille Noire in Britain: George Salting and William Lever In view of the different accounts from literary sources, it further needs to be investigated why one would have wanted to “fake” Famille Noire ware at the period. A stylistic analysis of some large scale Famille Noire objects was therefore ventured on. Two British collections with a considerable number of Famille Noire vases were taken as the source for this undertaking: the Salting collection in the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Lady Lever Art Gallery in Port Sunlight near Liverpool. George Salting (1835-1909) who was an emigrated Australian amassed an extensive collection of Qing dynasty (1644-1911 AD) porcelains, amongst many other artistic categories, in the second half of the nineteenth century and the first decade of the twentieth century. He bought the majority of large scale Famille Noire vases in the 1870s and 1880s, against the common proposition that the craze for these objects was at its peak around and after 1910 only. The Lady Lever Art Gallery in Port Sunlight was established by the soap-manufacturer William Hesketh Lever (1851-1925), who built a collection of Chinese porcelains from about 1890 to 1924. He would purchase his Famille Noire wares from different sources, although he tended to buy other collectors’ collections “wholesale”. When returning to the question of why one would have felt the need to produce “fake” black ground objects, one explanation might be found in the type of decoration illustrated on those objects. A square-shaped vase with tapering sides from the Salting collection (Fig. 8-1) bears the typical design of the large scale Famille Noire style with flowering prunus blossoms, plants and a bird on a black ground, as well as the inclusion of iron red enamel. This aesthetic type of decoration was strongly appealing to the English and later on the American buyers. It was reminiscent of original export Kangxi wares that were admired and acquired in large masses during the Aesthetic Movement. In the mid-nineteenth century, the Aesthetic Movement was in vogue in Britain, promoted by artists such as Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1828-1881) and James Abbot McNeill Whistler (1834-1902). Both artists appreciated blue and white porcelains and purchased high quality pieces themselves. Consequently, Chinese

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porcelains decorated with prunus or “hawthorn” blossom on a blue crackled ground, amongst other similar pieces, established a fashion during the last decades of the nineteenth century, and particularly from the 1860s onwards. Originally, the prices of blue and white were rather reasonable, due to the great availability of wares that often came out of the Netherlands; however, owing to the trend set by artists such as Whistler, the fluctuation of blue and white in Great Britain was high and culminated in the sale of one Prunus Blossom Jar for an astonishing price of £5,900 in 1905 (Reitlinger 1970, 202-12). This development is likely to have complied considerably with the stance taken towards the aesthetic value of Famille Noire vases that bear similar decorations to blue and white, and the rarity of the colour would have instigated the curiosity of collectors to purchase that type of porcelain. We might therefore venture to compare an original blue and white Kangxi piece to the already mentioned Famille Noire vase, both from the Salting Collection, to assess the similarities in the aesthetic appearance of both objects. The parallels in the type of decoration are evident. The blue and white Kangxi vase with tapering sides (Fig. 8-2) displays similar delicate branches of flowering blossoms as the black piece and the decorative idea from the original Kangxi piece was undoubtedly translated onto the black-ground object (Fig. 8-1). Such similarities could have contributed to the continuing hype for decorative features such as prunus blossom, flowering trees and further floral motifs on Famille Noire, and yet one can observe significant differences in the general arrangement between the two pieces. Whereas the blue and white vase displays a properly balanced and elegantly flowing, reduced decorative pattern on both sides, the Famille Noire replicates the same motif on all sides, which results in a very dense composition that is not well thought out. The shape could be another indicator for the black vase as not belonging to the Kangxi period. When comparing the shape of another Famille Noire vase from the Salting Bequest (C. 1305-1910) to that of the documented Kangxi piece, the blue and white piece appears much more substantial and heavy, by being almost straight sided; both black pieces, on the other hand, possess a more conical and steeply tapering profile. These observations in terms of decoration and shape can be seen as first signs of Famille Noire vases not having been produced in the Kangxi era (Rosenfeld Pomper, et al. 2009, 107), but one has to elaborate on the context of the art market, prices and documentary evidence in order to highlight the relevance of this supposition.

Famille Noire on the Western Art Market It was pointed out before that all black ground vases in George Salting’s

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collection were predominantly acquired in the 1870s and 1880s, and some in the early years of the twentieth century. On the basis of purchase information the prices for Famille Noire vases collected by him ranged between £60 and £600 from 1870 to 1901 (George Salting`s receipted bills, Guildhall library). These prices were certainly considerably high compared to blue and white wares. However, in a different market, such as the American one, even higher prices were paid for black ground objects. For when one “black vase with a trumpet neck and white prunus blossom tinged with red”, originally in Salting’s possession, was bought by the enigmatic art dealer Joseph, Baron Duveen (1869-1939) from another dealer, it was sold on to the American collector James Garland (1840-1902) for £1,300 in 1891. (Reitlinger 1970, 327). This was a much higher price compared to the average the English collector would generally pay. Possibly owing to Garland’s purchase activity of Famille Noire, the American market gradually became more involved in the purchase of that type of ware, and consequently, the Famille Noire style became the so-called “Millionaire’s taste” in America after 1910. The British market could not measure the extent to which Americans were willing to spend money on Famille Noire. When the collection of the financier John Pierpont Morgan (1837-1913) was bought by Baron Duveen’s uncle, Henry Duveen (1855-1918) in 1913, it was sold to the collectors P.A.B. Widener (1834-1915), John D. Rockefeller Jr. (1874-1960) and Henry Clay Frick (1849-1919). It included the following valuations: the previously mentioned vase from George Salting was valued at £30,000, and two Famille Verte pieces formerly belonging to Salting were valued at similar prices. In 1919, the British dealer Frank Partridge (1875-1953), who had businesses in both London and New York, sold another Famille Noire vase to James D. Rockefeller for £12,000 (Reitlinger 1970, 328). The Duveen family, amongst other dealers, most certainly had their share in this development, as they obviously came to understand through the sales of the Garland and Morgan collections that such extreme prices could only be realised in America. The peak for Famille Noire was reached between 1914 and 1920 and a decrease of prices can be observed after that period. The Lady Lever Art Gallery in Port Sunlight was established by the soap-manufacturer William Hesketh Lever. As Lever purchased some other collectors’ collections “wholesale”, it is more difficult to identify individual prices for Famille Noire in his collection. On average, he would spend about £350 for a black vase. According to the information given in the Salting and Lever documentations, one could conclude that the prices of large scale Famille Noire vases ranged from £60 to £350 between 1870 and 1890, primarily in Britain, and prices could reach anything from £1,000 to

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£12,000 up to the year 1919, when Famille Noire prices were at their highest. However, the latter price of £12,000 was only achieved on the American market. In 1914, John D. Rockefeller (1839-1937) was said to have paid £72,000 for 25 pieces of blue and white jars with prunus blossom design, as well as Famille Noire, which was a respectable sum. It can be believed that prices on the American market increased so enormously because, first of all, some art dealers with branches in both Britain and America significantly promoted this type of ware through lavishly produced sales catalogues. They possibly tempted their American clients to imitate the British connoisseurship in buying Famille Noire. They also knew that they could ask much higher prices owing to their new clientele’s enormous wealth. It therefore comes as no surprise when Joseph Duveen (1869-1939) would have been willing to pay the extraordinary amount of £10,000 for a pair of square black vases from the Earl of Exeter as early as 1895 (Reitlinger 1970, 326-7). However, this transaction never happened. The two vases were sold from Burghley House, Lincolnshire in a Christie’s sale already in 1888 for the astonishingly low price of £341,15s. 0d, because of the conception that they could be works of Samson in Paris. Duveen was unimpressed by this assumption and offered the double of his initial amount in 1905, but the vases were finally acquired by a private collector who presented them as gifts to the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam in 1928, where they are still catalogued as Kangxi pieces (Jörg 1997, 194). Aside from the noteworthy story on their price development, there are several aspects of these vases that are worth mentioning in the discussion of Famille Noire, namely in terms of stylistic features and documentary evidence. First, they appear almost identical when compared to George Salting’s vase (Fig. 8-1). From their stylistic appearance the two pieces were most likely a produce of the same time and place as the Salting piece. It was again John Alexander Pope who expressed doubts on their authenticity and who argued that no documentary evidence revealed when they came into the collection of Burghley House. Therefore, there was no proof for them being authentic Kangxi wares (Pope 1974, 89). During a visit to Burghley House in April 2008, where the actual inventories were examined, it could be established that those vases did not appear in any of those inventories that would temporally correspond to the Kangxi period. They only appear in the last inventory of 1854, catalogued as A Pair of Black (with Painted Flowers) Quadrangular Jars. Although this documentary evidence does not necessarily prove that those pieces were produced in the nineteenth century, since they could have been housed elsewhere before, their striking stylistic similarities to other vases in the collections of George Salting and William Lever lead to the assumption that

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they are most likely new inventions with a black ground dating to the mid-nineteenth century. It was the time when a demand for objects replicated the style of blue and white “aesthetic” pieces was nourished. Bearing this hypothesis in mind, a brief discussion of selected examples from both the Lever and Salting collections shall raise the probability that Famille Noire large scale vases were inventions of the nineteenth century. One of the most popular types of a black ground vase that can be found in many collections in Britain and America is that of a baluster vase with a trumpet-shaped neck and the decoration of prunus blossom, birds, rocks and trees. When comparing the two vases from the Salting (Fig. 8-3) and Lever (LL 6130) collections to each other, one can establish that they look very much alike in terms of shape and decoration. However, in comparison to an original trumpet-shaped vase from the Kangxi period, the shape of the Salting and Lever examples appears most unconvincing. First of all, it misses the balance of an original Kangxi piece. The lower body appears too heavy in contrast with the elongated neck, and the transition between upper and lower part is not convincingly carried out. If one compares their decorative style to the mentioned blue and white piece (Fig. 8-2), the decoration crowds the surface and the flower motifs are repetitive. Furthermore, the rocks appear particularly flat and unnatural. Their translucent colouring does not correspond to the saturated green of the Kangxi period. From a stylistic point of view, both pieces give the impression of a new invention of the Kangxi style; the arrangement is not lively enough, as the decoration is busy and repetitive, and in general the composition misses the elegant flow of authentic Kangxi period pieces. Both the Salting and Lever collections possess more of this type and the Frick collection is particularly rich in exactly that type of object (Pope 1974, 106-11). Other British collectors who bought that material were, for example, Augustus Wollaston Franks (1826-1897), Keeper of Antiquities at the British Museum, and the merchant George R. Davies (1844-1918). The catalogue of the Franks collection was produced in 1876. It establishes a terminus ante quem for a production of some large scale Famille Noire before 1876. Pieces such as the above discussed objects are likely to have been produced earlier than the publication of this catalogue (Franks 1876). Owing to their general aesthetic appeal, the author would therefore assign the previously discussed objects to the 1860s or 1870s, where the vases could have been created for the European market, in order to fulfil the growing demand for aesthetic and Japanesque style objects. There are many more pieces continuing the described style in all the aforementioned collections, which are realised in different shapes and with slightly diverging decoration. Motifs representing the flowers of the fours seasons

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can often be found on rectangular vases with tapering sides, and dragon motifs in imitation of Ming porcelains are also to be found. Finally, one further category of Famille Noire must not be forgotten, namely that one which included pieces of original Kangxi porcelain, re-decorated in the Famille Noire palette. One of those objects is Salting’s first ever purchase of Chinese porcelain, bought around 1870 (Fig. 8-4). It could be detected that the original neck was ground and polished away, as it would have originally possessed a trumpet-shaped neck. The base is cut off very pronounced and bears pinpricks from the firing, and the porcelain clay displays a greyish-white colour. All these factors implicate an original Kangxi porcelain body. Most likely, the piece was damaged and instead of disposing of it, it was re-used and re-decorated with a later adornment dating to the second half of the nineteenth century, in order to fulfil the growing demand for black wares. The arrangement and colouring of all decorative components are unnatural. This piece is not the only one of that category, and in the course of analysing pieces from the Salting and Lever collections, it becomes evident that many re-decorated pieces of original Kangxi porcelain seem to have co-existed with the “new” creations of Famille Noire produced in the nineteenth century. From today’s point of view, only small scale objects with a black ground could be identified as authentic Kangxi pieces, as the colouring and decoration on them was easier to handle. The lustrous black ground might, however, have encouraged a production of new, large scale pieces in a similar style. The manufacture of objects in different workshops is another aspect for judging Famille Noire. From today’s perspective, it can be taken for granted that large objects of Famille Noire never were of imperial quality, and thus, they were not produced in the imperial kilns. The lack of large scale pieces in imperial Chinese collections sustains this assumption (Pope 1974, 90). It was also suggested that some Famille Noire were produced in France or elsewhere outside China. The Burghley House pieces, which were mistaken for Samson wares in the late nineteenth century, make theses suppositions plausible (Reitlinger 1970, 212; Knittler 2011a, 91). At the same time, another theory had been emerging regarding the origin of Famille Noire wares. Gerald Reitlinger mentioned that Famille Noire had been sought after by Cixi ს᛼ (1835-1908), the Empress Dowager who virtually ruled China between the 1860s and early 1900s. She preferred the colour black, and consequently, everything that was suitable was hunted for purchase. Since the supply of original wares was short, large scale Famille Verte were blacked in order to fulfil the demand, and later on such objects were deliberately forged (Reitlinger 1970, 212). In an e-mail correspondence to the author, an American antiques dealer put forward the same argument and

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indicated that Cixi was enamoured with Famille Noire and re-introduced the colour palette that had become popular in the Kangxi period, but was not produced anymore during her time. Most pieces extant today were likely to be actual replicas made during her lifetime and were imitating the earlier Kangxi style. The lack of Famille Noire in imperial collections weakens the above argument that Cixi alone was responsible for the production of those wares. The “revival” of a Kangxi style might have originated in China, from a need to supply pieces for the Empress. Nevertheless, I believe that a simultaneous production of black ground wares for a different market, such as the Western one, was likely to have been going on at the same time. This “reproduction” process was carried out on such a large scale that eventually, many pieces might even have been decorated in China by Europeans who transformed original Chinese designs to cater for their personal taste. In summary, Famille Noire wares can be divided into three categories: 1) those wares including complete new inventions of the nineteenth century in the style of “aesthetic” blue and white Kangxi pieces; 2) re-decorated pieces of original Kangxi porcelain; and 3) original pieces of black Kangxi porcelain on a small scale, such as cups and saucers in Augustus the Strong’s collection in Dresden.

Scientific Analysis of Famille Noire A final assessment that might clarify speculations surrounding the authenticity of Famille Noire could be accomplished by means of a scientific analysis, which could examine the chemical composition of glaze, enamels and porcelain body. In the discussion with staff members from Imperial College London and the Victoria and Albert Museum, it was established that such a project would require a wide time-frame and the availability of certain technical equipment, which was not manageable during the period assigned to this research. However, a project that looked at the scientific analysis of Famille Noire had been initiated in the United States in 2007, and the results of a preliminary study had been published in the autumn of 2009 (Rosenfeld Pomper, et al. 2009, 104-10). The initial research was aiming at identifying characteristics of chemical composition and physical microstructure in order to clearly differentiate Kangxi examples from those manufactured in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. However, the key problem to the approach was that pieces needed to be placed with certainty in one of those categories, which was problematic, as there were not enough scientifically documented Kangxi pieces. Secondly, no archaeological source of sherds was available for a non-destructive method of analysing the objects. The approach to the

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study was therefore modified in that as many Famille Noire pieces as possible should be inspected in a non-destructive way, in the hope that key features could be found and should then be photographed. An initial examination was therefore carried out in bright sunlight, when it was possible, and a 3x visor and a 10x loupe were used. In one of the objects from a private collection, they featured decorative white panels that were certainly done in a high-temperature glaze, and on most other pieces studied, the decorative areas (mostly flowers and panels) were created with colourless enamel that seemed to sit directly on the biscuit. The most characteristic feature was the crackle, and interestingly, most of the stylistically questionable pieces did not show crackle in the white. As for the black, large areas designed to become the black background appeared to be painted with a broader brush and were more opaque when not covered with enamel. In bright sunlight, the black ground tended to look mottled. The black was indeed covered with dark green enamel, and the black ground was established as being relatively thin, which refers to a surface continuity where black and green portions of the design were contiguous. Two pieces of particular interest were further examined in collaboration with the Department of Scientific Research of the Metropolitan Museum of Art: one garlic-mouthed vase and one saucer, the latter of which was well accepted as having been made in the eighteenth century. Due to its rather unusual shape, the vase is not entirely congruent with the large scale Famille Noire objects discussed in this paper, however in terms of decoration, it possesses certain similarities. For the analysis of those pieces, the scientific instrument used was a Jordan Valley EX6600 open architecture x-ray fluorescence spectrometer (XRF) and the system was flushed with helium gas to permit detection of elements from magnesium upward. It could be concluded that both pieces were covered with a colourless high-temperature glaze on the underside and that in general, little difference between the two pieces could be detected in terms of chemistry. The authors had never come across a vase of this shape in the Kangxi period. Hence, it was suggested that, should it indeed be a nineteenth century piece, late Qing potters were able to duplicate earlier ceramic chemistry. This is an interesting aspect and would certainly not contradict my argument that many large scale Famille Noire objects were actually produced in the nineteenth century. However, at this stage the findings of the scientific analysis were regarded as rather preliminary and it was ascertained by Linda Rosenfeld Pomper and her co-authors that the project would remain a complex one. With the help of both stylistic and scientific analysis, large scale pieces

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of Famille Noire will eventually be identified correctly and labelled adequately. It is believed that a highly valuable contribution would be made to the history of collecting large scale Famille Noire in Europe and the United States, and that the results from a scientific analysis could be of great benefit for many collections that house such pieces.

Works Cited Primary Sources Franks, Augustus W., Sir. 1876. Catalogue of a Collection of Oriental Porcelain and Pottery lent for Exhibition by A. W. Franks. London: George E. Eyre and William Spottiswoode. Inventory of 1854, Burghley House Archive, Lincolnshire. Jacquemart, Albert. 1873. History of the Ceramic Art, trans. Bury Palliser. London: Sampson Low, Marston Low and Searle. Litchfield, Frederick. 1900. Pottery and Porcelain: A Guide to Collectors. New York: J Lane and London: Turslove, Hanson and Comba. MS 19473 (1) and (2), P.W. Flower & Sons, Guildhall Library Manuscript section, London Metropolitan Archives, London. Partridge files, 1915-1922, Lady Lever Art Gallery Archive, Port Sunlight and online catalogue: http://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/ladylever/collections/chinese Nominal File SALTING, George MA/1/5293/1-8, Victoria and Albert Museum Archive, London. Registers Ceramics and Glass, C. 1001-1910 – C. 1299-1910 and C. 1300-1910 – C. 1707-1910, Victoria and Albert Museum, Far Eastern Department, London.

Secondary Sources Impey, Oliver. 1992. Lever as a Collector of Chinese Porcelain. Journal of the History of Collections 4, 1: 235-6. Jörg, Christiaan J.A and Jan van Campen. 1997. Chinese Ceramics in the Collection of the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, Ming and Qing Dynasties. London: Philip Wilson. Knittler, Konstanze. 2011a. Motivations and Patterns of Collecting, George Salting, William G. Gulland and William Lever as Collectors of Chinese Porcelain. Ph.D. diss., University of Glasgow. —. 2011b. Fakes or Reinventions? Famille Noire Porcelains in 19th Century British Collecting. Orientations 42, 6: 110-5.

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Rosenfeld Pomper, Linda, Jeffrey P. Stamen and Norman R. Weiss. 2009. Research on the Question of Dating Chinese Famille Noire Porcelain. In Scientific Research on Historic Asian Ceramics: Proceedings of the Fourth Forbes Symposium at the Freer Gallery of Art, ed. Blythe McCarthy, 104-10. London: Archetype. Pope, John Alexander. 1974. The Frick Collection: An Illustrated Catalogue, vol. 7, Porcelains, Oriental and French. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Reitlinger, Gerald. 1970. The Economics of Taste, Vol. 2, The Rise and Fall of Objets d'art Prices since 1750. London: Barrie & Jenkins. Wood, Nigel. 1999. Chinese Glazes: Their Origins, Chemistry and Recreation. London: A&C Black.

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Fig. 8-1. Famille Noire vase with straight sides, decorated with blossoming flowers and birds, nineteenth century. 48 x 14.6cm. C. 1303-1910, Salting Bequest. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

Fig. 8-2. Blue and white vase, decorated with blossoming flowers and trees, Kangxi period (1662-1722). 48 x 14.6cm. C. 991-1910, Salting Bequest. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

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Fig. 8-3. Famille Noire vase with trumpet-shaped neck, decorated with blossoming flowers, rocks, birds and trees, nineteenth century. 70.5 x 28.3cm. C. 1314-1910, Salting Bequest. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

Fig. 8-4. Famille Noire vase with baluster shaped lower body, decorated with flowers, rocks, birds and trees. 37.5 x 20cm. C. 1311-1910, Salting Bequest, the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. Photograph by Konstanze A. Knittler.

CHAPTER NINE WESTERN EXPECTATIONS AND THE QUESTION OF SELF-EXOTICISM IN THE WORKS OF CONTEMPORARY IRANIAN PHOTOGRAPHERS SAMINE TABATABAEI

This paper examines the works of Iranian photographers since the 1990s when there was a growing interest in Middle Eastern art. Various artistic tendencies have become prominent, mainly in response to the Western art market and its expectations. Exhibitions of Middle Eastern art in general, and Iranian art in particular, have given exposure to Iranian artists, while certain names have recurred on different curatorial lists. The hunt for artists and trends is still in full swing, while newly established galleries and artistic institutions in the Middle East are trying to cash in on the booming market. All these phenomena necessitate a closer look at the art scene of the region and raise the question of how the art market is shaped by Western expectations. In this paper, I will examine contemporary Iranian photography by looking at the works of two well-established Tehran-based photographers, Shadi Ghadirian (b. 1974) and Sadegh Tirafkan (b. 1965). I will focus on the issue of self-exoticism which conforms to Western ideological and political expectations of the country. I will also discuss the notion of exoticism vis-à-vis photography, and more specifically, the rapport between exoticism and the representation of Iranian national identity among the works of sought-after Iranian photographers.

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National Identity and the Representation of Difference National identity 1 is a conceptual marker of difference. One of the definitions of national identity is national difference which points to the cultural specificities of a country. These specificities are always couched in stereotypes that appear in written and visual media as well as living culture. Works of art as a feature of living culture do not take shape in a vacuum; they are reflections of their cultural and political origins and are responses to the works of artists of previous generations. As a result, the work of art harbours emblems of the artist’s locatedness. In the age of globalisation, the representation of localities is considered a positive attribute of an artwork. This is especially true for those cultures outside the sphere of the dominant Western culture of the art scene. In other words, a work of art must bear a cultural difference marker in order to attract the attention of the international art market. Culture and nationality are not fixed, definite or immutable phenomena, thus the criteria through which they are evaluated should be dynamic and not be solely based on the historical Western canon. During the past few decades, artists coming from different parts of the world and from various cultures have been given a chance in the international scene. To some extent, Iran’s artistic scene seems successful in art markets outside of the nation, but contemporary Iranian arts—for example, its cinema and photography—does not play an influential role in the country. The lack of investment in cultural infrastructure is one reason to explain the inadequate publicity for local art. As a result, most of the Iranian artworks exhibited outside the country are by and large detached from their source of inspiration because the artists aim to gain recognition in the eyes of the Western viewer. Hence, they simply conform to an image of Middle Eastern art constructed in the West decades after the publication of Edward Said’s Orientalism (1978). 



Exoticism as a Way of Encountering the Cultural Other The term “exoticism” is indefinite and ambiguous. In Srilata Ravi’s words: In its most simplified form it [exoticism] signifies foreignness. Arguably, the basic condition of exoticism is the existence and autonomy of alternative 1 In this paper, national identity is discussed in relation to its role in reinforcing cultural stereotypes of Otherness.

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Chapter Nine space and culture. However, the very fact that this foreignness exerts a certain force, suggesting both a physical and a metaphysical identification, renders this definition problematic and raises ideological, philosophical, political, aesthetic and existential issues … [This] forces the researcher to define location of the self with respect to the observed exotic, and to adopt a specific time frame, and to focus on a specific issue that his idea inspires in order to work out a productive analysis (Ravi 2000, 53).

Here exoticism is the process through which the Orient mimics the image constructed by the Occident. As Homi Bhabha puts it: Colonial mimicry is the desire for a reformed, recognizable Other, as a subject of a difference that is almost the same, but not quite. Which is to say, that the discourse of mimicry is constructed around an ambivalence; in order to be effective, mimicry must continually produce its slippage, its excess, its difference (Bhabha 2006, 122).

This colonial mimicry is applicable to the situation in Iran both before and after the 1979 Revolution. Despite never having been directly colonised by a foreign force, there exist moments in Iranian history when foreign countries have influenced various aspects of Iran’s policies. In these moments of Iranian history—including the last decade, which I will discuss later—the desire to reproduce “a reformed, recognizable” image constructed of the Other has led to the adoption of a predominantly Orientalist image, which has found a new veneer and emphasis since the 1979 Revolution. The Islamic Republic projects and exports an image that reinforces some of the familiar features of the Orientalist view. By examining the most exhibited photos of Iranian photography outside the country, I will further discuss how some features of the image of Iran being fostered after the 1979 Revolution comply with the West’s Oriental clichés of the East.

Photography and Colonialism in Iran Photography has consistently been a medium for capturing the cultural Other. In relation to its function in establishing the colonial power of the West, Robert Stam and Louise Spence state: The magic carpet provided by these apparatuses [cameras] flies us around the globe and makes us, by virtue of our subject position, its audio-visual masters. It produces us as subjects, transforming us into armchair conquistadors, affirming our sense of power while making the inhabitants of

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the Third World objects of spectacle for the First World’s voyeuristic gaze (Stam and Spence 2006, 110).

As a medium that freezes the cultural Other in time and space, photography reaffirms the dominant position of the one who actively takes photos. In many ways, it also helps to categorise the Other in the Western ethnographic and anthropologic body of knowledge. Categorisation is the prevailing approach to establish the cultural Other. It allays the inherent fear of encountering Otherness and pigeonholes the Other into pre-existing categories. In Nissan N. Perez’s “Focus East: Early Photography in the Near East” (quoted in Behdad 2001), he maintains that the history of photography grew in parallel with an increasing tendency for travel and the expansion of colonialism in the region. The body of information thus accumulated about the Middle East became a very good source for further categorisation and stereotyping. Because of its association with reality, photography is a site of stereotyping, especially in its role as a provider of material for ethnic anthropology. The initial assumption about photographs’ reflection of reality still holds, even in the age of digital manipulation of images. An uninitiated viewer always looks for traces of reality in a photograph, especially one of a marginalised culture. Although photography in Iran, unlike other artistic forms, arrived at the same time as its introduction in the West, its development was starkly different from its Western counterpart. Socio-cultural issues have always been at the forefront of artistic practices in Iran. 2 Photography in particular found new directions after the 1979 Revolution. 



The Development of National Art in Iran The effort to find trends in national art in Iran dates back to the 1960s, with the Saqqakhane Movement. This movement was a ramification of two main objectives of Iran’s art scene in the 1950s and 1960s: 1) to make its artistic achievements known in the international art scene; and 2) to establish a national art scene in Iran (Keshmirshekan 2005, 626). In other words, Saqqakhaneh artists aimed at being both global and local. Their 2

Having influenced by the general policies after the 1979 Revolution, changes in the artistic agenda of the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance, which is in charge of imposing the government’s ideas on art and artistic affairs, bring an impact on Iranian art in different ways. The specific political regulation of art by the state in different presidential periods needs to be further studied. For brief notes on art in the Reformists era, see Keshmirshekan 2007, 335-66.

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works were filled with references to traditional, religious folk cultures, and to commercial products, which were brought together to create a national identity. Persian calligraphy, inscription, and epigraphy of the Iranian past appeared in various works by Saqqakhaneh artists, as did traditional Islamic ornaments and motifs. The ideas that sprung out of the Saqqakhane Movement and their objectives still persist in later artistic trends and movements. After the 1979 Revolution, Iran underwent fundamental socio-political transformations. The seclusion from the West, the prevailing anti-Western stance, and the lack of direct and overt cultural contact with other countries alienated Iran from the West. The new cultural policies furthered the cultural alienation. As a case in point, Elli Lester Roushanzamir discusses how U.S. print media constructed a “commodified vision of Iran by using consistent and iconic images of Iranian women” (Roushanzamir 2004, 9). The stereotypical image of the Oriental woman played a pivotal role in the construction of the discourse of Orientalism; reviving old stereotypes along with the new image revolutionary officials were trying to project. This has been a key strategy in projecting an essentialist and reductionist reading of the image of the nation. This strategy has been pursued widely by most of the Western news media. The Iran-Iraq War (1980-8) was another major site of propaganda. It gave rise to an image-making machine that churned out Islamic ideals and anti-Western tendencies. Images of martyrdom were used to highlight the valiant objectives of the Revolution until the Reformist won in 1997. When the Reformist administration came to power, the art scene inside Iran started to come out of its isolation because restrictive policies were somewhat relaxed. A more open atmosphere encouraged students to study visual arts in universities. Their active participation infused new blood into artistic practices. Against the backdrop of international artistic events and a critical evaluation of the works of Iranian artists of previous generations, new themes appeared in response to contemporary social challenges. Gender, environmental and ecological issues came to the foreground, while artists employed a critical approach towards traditional aspects of Iranian culture. In dealing with these sensitive subjects, most of these artists employed metaphorical and allegorical language to tackle the generally prohibitive policies toward the presentation of artworks in public galleries and museums. Along with these variations in themes, new media like video, installation and photography provided greater expressive possibilities for the younger generation to make their voices heard. At the same time, works of art which were not encouraged and propagated by cultural authorities remained little known by the public. A

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budget was set aside for government institutions to purchase works of art during the Reformist administration, but official policies generally promoted the values of the Revolution which marginalised many artists in the art market. Though insufficient, a growing number of art galleries in Tehran tried to promote works of independent artists. The international success of a number of Iranian artists such as Shirin Neshat (b. 1957) and Abbas Kiarostami (b. 1940) led many artists to look for audiences outside Iran. In recent years, Dubai, driven by Western art market models, has established its own agenda which to some extent mimics the Western approach to art categorised as marginalised. Famous art auctions and art fairs in Dubai, and the ambitious plans for building replicas of the most prestigious museums of the West in the United Arab Emirates, enticed many artists in the region to gear their works towards that market. Young artists living in the country had acquainted themselves with the language of new artistic media, thrived in Dubai without corresponding success in Iran. Those work produced for Western and Western-influenced markets detached from its social origins, and I think, this kind of artistic production deserves more attention in the study of contemporary Iranian art. Much has been said about the issue of local versus global within the Iranian art scene. With the growth of biennials and art venues, Third World artists tried to come up with a formula to gain a foothold in the global scene. They had to appeal to local markets in order to entice the global art establishment. Success in making use of regional and local markets led to global recognition. In Iran, this formula functioned in the opposite direction; for Iranian artists, international acknowledgement would bring local recognition. This was not only true for those artists living in Iran, but also for many others living abroad. For example, Shirin Neshat has exhibited her photographs in Iran on a few occasions, but her fame is mostly known outside the country. Her popular appeal is limited to the Women of Allah series (1994). This inverted process of globalisation had negative effects on the Iranian art scene. No doubt one of the reasons is that independent artists in Iran cannot benefit from the local support mechanism in order to promote their art, yet they have to gain the attention of foreign curators and patrons. This absence from the public scene and the local media further marginalises Iranian artists, so their works become isolated from public view in Iran. Another important factor is that artists like Neshat fascinate with the Western imagination in which they are paragons of difference and exoticism. Critical writings on Iranian artists like Neshat appear in the West, but insufficient in-depth analysis of her work in Persian has resulted in blind acceptance of a monolithic and exotic reading of her work in Iran.

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Various discourses around art and cultural dilemmas concerning the promotion of artwork in Iran have directed many young artists to grapple with the question of their cultural identity.

Western Expectations of Iran’s Image The 1979 Revolution was a turning point in the relationship between Iran and the West on all levels. The revolutionary ideology was implemented in every national and international policy. Apart from social reforms and their impacts on the art scene, one witnessed the changing approach of the West towards Iran. The West reinforced different images of Iran which became prevailing stereotypes about the country after the Revolution, i.e. the stereotypes the previous political regime (1925-1979) tried to play down. These recurring stereotypes of the nation established Iran as the Othered country in the Middle East for the West. As Christina Ljunberg states: The encounter between the self and other and the interpretation of other cultures does not involve empathy or identification with another culture, but instead, it involves entering the other culture and then returning to a position outside it (Ljunberg 2003, 69).

From this external vantage point, the expectations of the Other have been formed. These expectations mostly target collections, groups and categories. The Other does not have individuality, but is recognised by the characteristics of the group or category that it has been associated with. In the art world, artists have always been differentiated from each other by their singularity. Dina Ramadan states that: … the Western artist is considered as an individual, his art approached because of its exceptionality, his non-Western counterpart is selected to ‘represent’ a collective. And so the non-Western artist finds himself the mouthpiece of a much larger body, burdened by the expectations of both those who have assigned him that role and those whom he is forced to speak on behalf of (Ramadan 2004, 3).

There exist expectations which coerce non-Western artists be representative of their culture, country, religion, etc. In the Middle East, such expectations have made a spectacle of various stereotypes. Artists paint Oriental art in an ornamental and decorative manner, not on par with Western visual arts which are regarded as high art. The art scenes of marginalised countries do not correspond with the notion of contemporary art as understood through

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the Western lens. The question of Middle Eastern identity became important to Western viewers and created expectations which brought an impact on artists from the Middle East. To attract more attention from Western curators and art dealers, many artists from the Middle East incorporated characteristics of decorative and ornamental crafts which carry cultural codes and signs address the question of identity. This led to an assumption that a work of video, photography or installation art from the Middle East would be successful if it contained ornamental elements from the region. There are many examples of this assumption in the case of Iran; Shirin Neshat’s work is particularly illustrative. Although many have written that her artworks go beyond her distinct nationality and locatedness, it is clear that in the beginning of her artistic career Neshat attracted the attention of Western viewers by using Iranian cultural markers. In her Women of Allah series, she depicted a typical Iranian woman whose body was inscribed with a poem in Persian calligraphy alongside Eastern ornaments. The women in this series wear black chador. To Western viewers, this type of covering is related to Muslim women in general. Although the women whom Neshat depicted are not specifically Iranian, the artist was successful in constructing an image of Iranian women that is convincing to Western viewers. Features like Henna art, calligraphy and chador are important elements in her photographs that brought recognition to her work and marked her different identity. Other Iranian photographers’ works have fallen into the same reductionist categories. Their photos have been read through the same trajectory of Oriental images with the West’s limited current vocabulary for describing the visual culture of the Middle East. Regardless of the artwork’s themes and the artist’s intentions, in many cases these artworks are being interpreted or incorporated with issues of politics, gender, religion and identity, with an emphasis on their locatedness. Artists who conform to the expected image of Iran in their works have a chance to be representative of their country. What is important for the Western viewer is how the work reflects cultural differences which must be recognisable, so that one can differentiate an African-based work from a Middle Eastern one. By this, not only the hierarchical relations in the art world are maintained, but Western superiority is also preserved. This constructed hierarchy is fundamentally based on images. Hence, photography’s close affinity with reality and its undeniable role in the expansion of colonialism make it a good medium for studying Western expectations and their effects on the self-representation of a country.

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Artistic Photographers after the 1979 Revolution Apart from the impact of the 1979 Revolution on the art scene of Iran, the eight-year Iran-Iraq War (1980-8) had detrimental effects on the country’s economic and social livelihood. However, it bolstered the revolutionary zeal to export Islam. Visual arts could only be a vehicle for ideological indoctrination. As a result, most of the artists who had already established their reputation before the Revolution were marginalised, and many artists immigrated to the West. In the absence of cultural infrastructures that could widely promote art, only a few professional art galleries continued their work during the 1980s. Artists had to come up with creative ways to attract public attention. Nevertheless, Iranian artists have been able to gain international recognition since the 1990s. Once the war came to an end in 1988, and especially since the beginning of the Reform era in 1997, Iranian visual arts fared better. Since then, artistic photography has flourished. International recognition for Iranian cinema and photography gave way to more cultural interactions. A number of recently established photographers earned their reputation through the works of their predecessors. Haleh Anvari’s Chadornama (2005) 3 is an example showing how Neshat’s use of Iranian cultural markers has been reproduced in many layers. In this series, Anvari aestheticises the black-clad woman in Neshat’s photographs by introducing colours. In Chador-dadar (2006), she plays with Oriental stereotypes. She juxtaposes two faceless women clad in brightly coloured floral-printed chadors with an advertising image of Jean August Dominique Ingres’s (1780-1867) Grande Odalisque (1814). 4 Anvari emphasises the differences between the interior and exterior images of Oriental women. Women in nineteenth-century Orientalist paintings were always located in interior spaces, mostly in harem settings, depicted with seductive and inviting gestures that correspond to the fantasy of the male gaze in the West. In contrast, most of the Middle Eastern women depicted in exterior spaces were covered thoroughly. In this photo, Anvari shows this duality in Iranian women’s lives. This image of Iranian women also contrasts with the Western assumption of freedom by putting them in the context of a typical Western outdoor setting. By reminding the stereotypes of the Middle East, these photos have exoticised and alienated the representation of Iranian women. The two artists whom I am going to discuss are noteworthy because their works are multi-layered and offer many readings. However, most of these 



3 4



For the image of this work, see Anvari 2006. See the forth image from the top, left column in Anvari 2005.



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readings are tied to the predominant Western assumption about the Orient. Works by Shadi Ghadirian and Sadegh Tirafkan include Oriental attributes that abide by Western expectations in order to reproduce the familiar image of the Orient for Western audiences.

Case Study One: Shadi Ghadirian Shadi Ghadirian has exhibited her photographs worldwide. She has several series of photos that deal with socio-cultural themes having women as central figures in her works. One can distinguish a single visual strategy in her various photo series: juxtaposing objects which seem to be incompatible. In Ghadirian’s most exhibited collection, Qajar (1998), young Iranian women dressed like those of the Qajar era (1794-1925) standing against backdrops that resemble ones from the same period and look directly into the camera. In fact, Ghadirian appropriated existing historical Qajar photographs. Her photos recreate the mood of Qajar studios by covering the floor with a carpet, using wooden chairs decorated with carvings and adorning the back wall of the set with paintings from the era. Assorted objects, including a vacuum cleaner, a pair of sunglasses, a television, a record player and a Pepsi can, point to an incongruity. Daryush Shayegan maintains that: The discrepancy between these activities and the women’s outmoded look and haughty demeanour underscores the strangeness of this surrealistic situation. The bizarre, as such, becomes an event through which the juxtaposition of opposites emphasises the disturbing heterogeneity that is perniciously present in all our behaviour (Shayegan 2001, 10).

Some pictures in this series show that the women wear chador in the house. In Figs. 9-1 & 9-2, women are completely veiled and placed next to the items which did not exist in the Qajar era. In Fig. 9-1, two women stand next to a modern painting on an easel. Rough brushstrokes and haphazard stains can be seen in the painting. The painting refers to the history of art and the veil is a symbol of restriction. The juxtaposition of veiled women next to a painting suggests the absence of women painters in Iranian history. In Fig. 9-2, two veiled women, one standing and the other sitting, are holding a mirror which reflects part of the bookcase. Again, this suggests the absence of women from the history of Iranian literature. Although a few women from privileged social classes have engaged in writing and poetry, men have historically dominated the literary and artistic scene. In both photographs, Ghadirian depicts a bitter image of the social and historical

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limitations placed on women. There are several reasons why these photographs were well received in the West in the late 1990s. Shadi Ghadirian was among the first artists graduated from an Iranian university in photography after the 1979 Revolution. The Qajar collection includes features of Oriental art. The setting of the photographs is important because the Qajar era is the last historical dynasty in Iran in which the desirable Oriental fantasy of the West is fulfilled. The Qajar dynasty is unique in both nationalist and Orientalist historiography. As Ervand Abrahamian states: For the nineteenth century Europeans, the Qajar dynasty was an epitome of ancient oriental despotism; in fact, it was a failed imitation of such absolutism (Tavakoli-Targhi 2001, 6-7).

The Qajar era was the period of simultaneous existence of the binaries of modern/traditional and Western/Eastern. It was the last era when kings had harems. Ghadirian’s reproduction of the Qajar era brings back these Oriental fantasies. Although women in Ghadirian’s photographs are covered from head to toe with female dresses that look as if they are from the Qajar era rather than the typical Orientalist nude, they conform to the seductive images from that period because they are responsive to the voyeuristic Western gaze into the harem. The Qajar king Nasser al-Din Shah (1831-1896) was a photographer. He was among the first photographers to introduce the medium to the country. Nissan Perez points to the alignment of the inception of the medium in the West and the beginning of the history of photography in the Middle East. In fact, the medium became an apparatus for recording the Other in the Middle East. Needless to say, those images from the Qajar era confirmed the prevailing stereotypes constructed by European missionaries and travellers to the East. Photography proved to be a highly valuable tool in transforming the Orientalist system of knowledge by furnishing it with an efficient technological apparatus for gathering data (Behdad 2001, 143).

Nasser al-Din Shah’s photographs reproduced the prevailing Orientalist depictions of the Middle East. During this time Ghadirian became interested in Qajar photography, especially Nasser al-Din Shah’s photographs. Appropriating some features of Qajar photographs—those parts that conform to Oriental stereotypes—her photos summons a similar image of Iran that emphasises the backwardness of the country for a Western viewer. Her representation of women in

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settings without men is similar to Orientalist images. It plays into the same misconception that Western viewers in London had in her first exhibition of Qajar outside of Iran. According to Ghadirian, she was surprised by the reception of her works in London (Issa 2008). Viewers thought that women in Iran today wore the same dress, and her photos depict contemporary Iranian women. Shadi Ghadirian was among the first artists after the 1979 Revolution having the opportunity to exhibit her works in the West. The Lack of updated visual information about Iran after the Revolution—with the exception of those propagated by the State—leads Western viewers to imagine the unfamiliar cultural Other and to fit it into their imagination about the Other in the Middle East. To them, Qajar photographs simply conformed to the stereotypes of Oriental women in the harem. The experience of seeing Otherness through the image of women in exotic costumes is only pleasurable when the viewer looks at them from the perspective of a superior male cultural position. In a broader framework, assumed cultural superiority brings the joy of inhabiting the cultural Other. According to Gail Low, the knowledge of white skin underneath these exotic costumes worn by Western tourists in souvenir photographs enhances the pleasure of wearing it. She demonstrates that the pleasure of cross-cultural dressing was the outcome of racial differentiation. Here displacement is the critical point. Qajar photos give the same pleasure to Western viewers. As Reina Lewis states, cross-dressing is also related to the pleasure of consumption because of its transitory nature: “the Orient is a space full of enticing goods to be bought, savoured and worn” (Lewis 2006, 314). Delightful aspects of consumerism are emphasised in the pleasure of cross-dressing and in finding familiar objects such as a Pepsi can in Ghadirian’s photos. The misreading of Ghadirian’s anachronistic photos falls into the trap of Western expectations of Orientalism.

Case Study Two: Sadegh Tirafkan Sadegh Tirafkan is another internationally known Iranian photographer. In several exhibition catalogues and proceedings, he has been regarded as the examiner of the “real” situation of his country. These readings present him as an artist making a statement or a stance on the current situation in Iran. Most of his works include the juxtaposition of various traditional ornamental motifs taken from Persian miniatures or Persian carpets. In some cases, he took shots of the most important historical sites in Iran, Persepolis and Chogha Zanbil; in others, he used traditional markers of

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Iranian traditional culture such as the House of Strength, Zurkhane, 5 and religious symbols. He played with the visual features of national identity while placing himself in most of these photographs. In contrast to Ghadirian’s depiction of Iranian women, Tirafkan employs stereotypes of Oriental men. His photos may remind a hypothetical Western viewer of the pervasive images of Middle Eastern men as backward, violent, and rough. In his collection Hammurabi’s Law Code (2001) (Fig. 9-3), he brought to life a historical character, the Babylonian king Hammurabi (1792-1750 BC). Tirafkan states that the motivation for this series came from his learning that Hammurabi enacted laws punishing unfaithful wives (Tirafkan 2001). This can be seen as the re-enactment of the Western fantasy of Oriental men’s harems. Tirafkan located himself in between two women and all three were covered in mud, signifying the country’s ancient history. In another important series, Iranian Men (2000) (Figs. 9-4 & 9-5), Tirafkan turned his back to the camera, brandishing a dagger in his hand. He was covered by a traditional loincloth or long. Because he was faceless, he appeared to be more dangerous. He may remind a hypothetical Western viewer of stereotypes of dangerous Muslim men. The Persian calligraphy placed in the background of some of these photos is not legible to Western viewers, but it might appear recognisably Oriental, emphasising the geographical signification of such stereotypes. While this work may be more suggestive for a local viewer, Western viewers would most likely link Tirafkan’s work to their stereotypes of the Orient. 



Conclusion In Iranian Photography Now (2008), Homi Bhabha describes the current situation of photography in Iran as follows: It is one of the great tragedies of history that there are times when a whole country disappears behind a heavy curtain. Sometimes this is the result of an authoritarian regime that wants to darken the lives of its own people; at other times, those outside the country choose to see it, for their own purposes, through a veil of ignorance. Iran has suffered both fates (Bhabha 2008, 6).

It is remarkable that Iranian photographers contributed to build a bridge 5

Literally, Zurkhane means a “house of strength”. It is a traditional Iranian gymnasium for men which is not only about physical but also moral and ethical values in Iranian culture.

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between Iran and the West. However, the presence of Iranian art in the international art scene seems to be mediated by Western expectations. Western art institutions and art markets validate contemporary art around the world. Without indigenous scholars, curators and critics defining and promoting new art, the majority of artistic tendencies in Iran simply follow the trends and expectations dictated by the outside world. The Western interest in “fine arts” and the price that it carries have manipulated artistic practices in the Middle East, such that Middle Eastern artists tend to appropriate “Western-style fine art” and add “Orientalist flourishes” to their works (Somers Cocks 2009). At the same time, those artists who are aiming to go beyond the ethnic and national stereotypes of the West are being read and misinterpreted as if they are reproducing and reiterating these Orientalist clichés. National identity is highlighted in the most promoted Iranian works of art outside the country. This creates a huge gap between the art scene within and outside Iran. Artists remained in Iran mostly deal with current socio-political and cultural issues, but outside the country, their work is being read in compliance with Western biases about the Middle East. In this situation, Iranian photography would hardly be recognised as an art form in its own right.

Works Cited Printed Sources Behdad, Ali. 2001. The Power-Ful Art of Qajar Photography: Orientalism and (Self)-Orientalizing in Nineteenth-Century Iran. Iranian Studies 34, 1: 141-51. Bhabha, Homi. 2006. Location of Culture. New York: Routledge. —. 2008. Iranian Photography Now, ed. R. Issa, Deutschland: Hatje Cantz Verlag. Issa, Rose. 2008. Shadi Ghadirian: Iranian Photographer. London: Saqi Books. Keshmirshekan, Hamid. 2007. Contemporary Iranian Art: The Emergence of New Artistic Discourses. Iranian Studies 40, 3: 335-66. —. 2005. Neo-Traditionalism and Modern Iranian Painting: The Saqqa-khaneh School in the 1960s. Iranian Studies 38, 4: 607-30. Lester, Elli L. 2004. Chimera Veil of Iranian Woman and Processes of U.S. Textual Commodification: How U.S. Print Media Represent Iran. Journal of Communication Inquiry 28, 1: 9-28. Lewis, Reina. 2006. On Veiling, Vision and Voyage. In The Post-Colonial

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Studies Reader, ed. Bill Ashcroft, Gareth Griffiths and Helen Tiffin, 313-6. New York: Routledge. Ljunberg, Christina. 2003. Meeting the Cultural Other: Semiotic Approaches to Intercultural Communication. Studies in Communication Sciences 3, 2: 59-77. Ravi, Srilata. 2000. Exotic Reminiscences: The Feminine “Other” in French Fiction on South East Asia. French Cultural Studies 11, 31: 53-74. Said, Edward. 1978. Orientalism. New York: Vintage. Shayegan, Dariush, Ruyin Pakbaz, and Rose Issa. 2001. Iranian Contemporary Art. London: Both-Clibborn Editions. Stam, Robert, and Louise Spence. 2006. Colonialism, Racism and Representation. In The Post-Colonial Studies Reader, ed. Bill Ashcroft, Gareth Griffiths and Helen Tiffin, 109-12. New York: Routledge. Tavakoli-Targhi, Mohamad. 2001. Refashioning Iran: Orientalism, Occidentalism and Historiography. New York: Palgrave.

Internet Sources Anvari, Haleh. 2005, Chador-dadar, http://www.halehanvari.com/works.php?cid=7# (accessed May 26, 2011). —. 2006, Chadornama, http://www.halehanvari.com/works.php?cid=6# (accessed May 26, 2011). Cocks, Anna S. 2009. Are We Colonizing Middle Eastern Art? No One Needs Western-Style “Fine Art” with Some Orientalist Flourishes. The Art Newspaper, July/August 8, http://www.theartnewspaper.com/articles/Are-we-colonialising-Middle -Eastern-art?/18604 (accessed May 25, 2011). Ramadan, Dina. 2004. Regional Emissaries: Geographical Platforms and the Challenges of Marginalisation in Contemporary Egyptian Art. Proceedings of Apexart Conference 3, Honolulu, http://www.apexart.org/conference/ramadan.htm (accessed May 11, 2011). Tirafkan, Sadegh. 2001. Hammurabi’s Law Photo Essay, http://www.iranian.com/Arts/2001/November/Tir/index.html (accessed May 26, 2011).















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Fig. 9-1. Shadi Ghadirian, Qajar, 1998. Photograph. 100x 70 cm. © Courtesy of the artist.

Fig. 9-2. Shadi Ghadirian, Qajar, 1998. Photograph. 100 x 70 cm. © Courtesy of the artist.

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Fig. 9-3. Sadegh Tirafkan, Hammurabi’s Law Code, 2001. C Print. 60 x 90cm. © Courtesy of the artist.

Fig. 9-4. Sadegh Tirafkan, Iranian Men, 2000. C Print. 60 x 90cm. © Courtesy of the artist.

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Fig. 9-5. Sadegh Tirafkan, Iranian Men, 2000. C Print. 60 x 90cm. © Courtesy of the artist.

CHAPTER TEN NIHILIST NATIONALIST OR SYNCRETIC HYBRIDIST: A VISUAL ANALYSIS OF THE REPRESENTATIONS OF MISHIMA YUKIO IN THE 1985 EDITION OF BARAKEI 1 

YAYOI SHIONOIRI

The Collaboration of Two Geniuses For the Beautiful is nothing but the onset of that Terror we can scarcely endure, and we are fascinated because it calmly disdains to obliterate us. Every angel is terrifying (Rilke 1993, 3).

When Hosoe Eikoh า‫ۂ‬૎ֆ (b. 1933) was first asked to photograph Mishima Yukio Կ୾‫ط‬ધ֛ (1925-1970), little did Hosoe realise that he was embarking on a seminal collaboration with Mishima, where Hosoe would have a unique opportunity to curate the visual personae of a literary master. The photographic result, Barakei ό᜷᜺٩ύ—published in three editions and accompanied by Mishima’s text—was a truly unique combination of portraiture and photographic performance. Mishima’s literature, including his novels and plays, has long received worldwide recognition. His name carries with it a heavy legacy that touches 1

A version of this chapter was presented at the East & West: Cross-Cultural Encounters conference at University of St Andrews in September 2009, and the author would like to thank the participants at the symposium for their comments. In addition, a version of this chapter was originally published in the inaugural issue of Modern Art Asia. The author is indebted to Professors Matthew McKelway, Jonathan Reynolds and Toshio Watanabe for their thoughtful insights and to Professor Benjamin Mason Meier for his editorial assistance. All images have been reproduced with the kind permission of Hosoe Eikoh.

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on extremes ranging from his right-wing militant nationalism, fascination with homoeroticism 2 and tragic ritual suicide, 3 and volumes have been written on his eccentric lifestyle and the ideologies underpinning his life choices. 4 Despite the existence of this literature, few have focused on the artistic collaboration between Mishima and Hosoe. This chapter explores the visual testimony and representations of Mishima’s identity in the 1985 edition of Barakei, uncovering the possible goals and reception of the collaboration between these two strong personalities. 5 This research will show that Barakei is an important testimony to Mishima’s complex persona, unique for its visual representative format and the collaboration between photographer and subject. 















Hosoe Eikoh Curates the Body Born in 1933, Hosoe has come to occupy a place at the forefront of twentieth century Japanese photography. A 1954 graduate of the Tokyo College of Photography, Hosoe has served in various professional capacities, including as a Professor of Photography at the Tokyo Institute of Polytechnics and the Director of the Kiyosato Museum of Photographic Arts in Yamanishi prefecture. In July 1959, Hosoe, along with Tǀmatsu Shǀmei ࣟ࣪ᅃࣔ (b. 1930) and others, founded Vivo, a self-managed agency for the distribution of the group’s work. From the 1960s to the 1980s, Hosoe produced several publications that established his reputation, including Otoko to Onna (ψߊ圲Ֆω or “Men and Women” in 1961, featuring dancers’ bodies in movement) and Kamaitachi (ψ㋠ᡌωor “The

2

Although Mishima had a wife and children, he is known to have engaged in same-sex relationships. As far as the author knows, he neither publicly declared himself to be gay, nor openly associated himself as having a gay identity. However, he has certainly written about closeted homosexuals, for example, in his 1949 Confessions of a Mask, a semi-autobiographical account of a young homosexual who hides behind a metaphorical mask in order to fit into society. 3 On 25 November 1970, Mishima and four members of his Shield Society attempted a coup d’etat of the Tokyo headquarters of Japan’s Self-Defense Forces. After a planned speech to the soldiers that ended in mocking and jeering, Mishima committed ritual suicide. 4 For English language biographies on Mishima, see works by John Nathan and Henry Scott-Stokes. 5 As discussed in greater detail in the chapter, the author will focus on a visual analysis of the 1985 edition of Barakei, and the specific time in which such edition was published, with examinations of earlier editions in subsequent publications.

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Weasel’s Slash” in 1969, featuring Hijikata Tatsumi Ւֱ༎, a dancer and founder of butohʳ ፘᔏ, in a folk-tale-inspired narrative). Hosoe has been recognized for his work and awarded several accolades, including the New Artist Award of the Japan Photo Critics Association in 1960. Throughout Hosoe’s oeuvre, he remained preoccupied with the body in its various forms. While the human figure is often but a detail in a Chinese landscape painting, Hosoe primarily focuses his camera’s eye on the body. Unlike Hosoe’s contemporaries—such as Domon Ken Ւ ॰ ʳ ஜ , who photographed World War II survivors—Hosoe’s visual language is mythical, theatrical and “evoke[s] his memories [in a culture otherwise] renowned for its austerity” (Holborn 1999, 5). In doing so, Hosoe focused on producing a version of truth through the use of bodies, fiction-staging and stage-managing techniques (Fukushima 1991, 99). Simultaneously realist yet fantastical, Hosoe transports his viewing audience into a world that is claimed to exist, existing purely by the fact that the photographic image remains as evidence. Hosoe’s works have been described as “near mad … extremely high-voltage products of passion and genius” (Yoshimura 1982). Mishima himself has written that the gloominess permeating Hosoe’s art can “be best expressed as a feeling of isolation which refuses to be emancipated” (Mishima 1982). In such description, Mishima seems to be implying that Hosoe’s subjects have no recourse for survival but to face the world “shameless and without pride” (Ibid.). Hosoe’s work becomes significant for the unique theatricality that pervades his work. Furthermore, he is lauded as a Japanese photographer who has had the ability to weave aspects of Western photographic technology with ideas unique and indigenous to Japan, and is described as a “photographic ambassador of sorts, and a figure through whom the currents of Western photography enter Japan, just as he translates the ideas from his unique perspective for his students in workshops in the West” (Holborn 1999, 10). By using photography as his language, and focusing upon the human body as the subject, Hosoe has established a legacy of photographic narrative that provides a testimony to the version of truth he has captured.

Barakei as “Hosoe’s Best-Known Work” (Wilkes 2003, 344) Hosoe first met Mishima in September 1961 to photograph him for his first book of critical essays (Hosoe 2005, 132). Mishima had been impressed by Hosoe’s photography of Hijikata and had requested Hosoe to

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photograph him in his home (Ibid., 133). The collaboration continued through the summer of 1962 and resulted in the publication of Barakei in 1963, initially translated as Killed by Roses in English (Ibid., 137). 6 The 1963 edition became the basis for the publication of two other editions, one in 1971 after Mishima’s suicide, renamed Ordeal by Roses in English (Ibid., 140), 7 and one in 1985. 8 











The 1985 Edition While the Barakei project as a whole cannot be considered separately from Mishima’s life, the 1985 edition was published fifteen years after Mishima’s death. Speculation regarding the uncanny timing of Mishima’s death and the planned publication of the 1970 edition is raised, implying that Mishima may have planned for Barakei to be published as an homage to his fascination with death, immortalising himself as a martyr in reality, as well as in print. 9 For purposes of this chapter, and due to issues of access, the author will focus her visual analysis solely on the 1985 edition. In locating the time in which the 1985 edition was published, the author argues that the re-publication of Barakei in 1985 should be considered a result of a renewed focus on Mishima’s work and person, and not just a focus on the manner in which Mishima ended his life. 10 





6

1,500 copies of the 1963 edition were published, with each copy signed by Hosoe and Mishima. The 1963 version was awarded an accolade by the Photo Critics Society. 7 The publication of the 1971 edition was postponed due to Mishima’s untimely death. Certain scholars have discussed the uncanny timing of Mishima’s death and the planned publication of the 1971 edition, linking such timing to Mishima’s fascination with death. The contents of the 1971 edition were re-edited, and the sections of the book were restructured: “Eye of the Sea,” “Sin of the Eye,” “Dream of Sin,” “Death of Dream,” and “Death” (Mishima 1971, 392-3). Translation of section titles, author’s own. 8 The author has based her research on the 1985 edition of Barakei. The lush 1985 edition, published by Aperture in New York and designed by Awazu Kiyoshi, uses imperial purple and blood red in its design. Hosoe notes that the 1963 and 1971 versions are different in look; for example, the 1971 version was designed by Yokoo Tadanori 䊎‫࢘ݠ‬ঞʳ (b. 1936), and featured a white cover, a Western layout with horizontal text, and the title was stamped in red calligraphy. Unfortunately, the author was unable to procure copies of these extremely rare older editions. 9 Holborn has described Mishima’s death as a gesture of historical implication in perfect accord with the morbid and erotic aesthetic that pervades Mishima’s writing. 10 The author obviously does not intend to diminish the significance of the manner in which Mishima chose to end his life or the connections that can be made among his

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Barakei is consciously imbued with theatrical artifice. The 1985 edition of Barakei is composed of five parts.11 The first part, Mishima’s Prelude, includes a distorted close-up of a hand holding what appears to be a sword, or a lightening bolt. 12 Part Two, entitled “The Citizen’s Daily Round,” tells the madness of the solid, worthy and average citizen. Implying that all humans embody an element of madness when they are alone, Part Two begins with a cryptic quote from Upanishad: “The divinity seen within this eye is the Self.” Referencing elements of the divine, the act of viewing, the eye as vehicle, and the self-reflexive self, we come upon the first black and white photograph of Mishima, who stands in front of a series of steps leading to his home, clad in only a traditional white thong with a rose adorning his chest. His stare is provoking, yet vacant at the same time. Other images in this Part feature Mishima in bondage, with a thick black water hose bound around him. Part Three, entitled “The Laughing Clock or the Idle Witness,” finds Mishima becoming a “scoffer and a witness,” with Mishima observing that such a witness “laughs scornfully, watches, and does nothing.” In Part Four, “Divers Desecrations,” Mishima is plunged into the midst of ancient, artistic styles—sacred and sensual alike. Mishima impudently challenges these images, until he eventually creates in himself the “illusion that his body has become transparent.” In doing so, he feels that he can transcend time and space, “free to shift from one existence to another, from one life to another, released from all civic responsibilities.” Such dalliance cannot last forever, as Part Five brings the “Retribution of the Rose”—Mishima’s protracted㻃 and eternal execution. In drawing the collection to a close with implied death, Mishima is confronted with “torture and extinction infinitely delayed.” 





Mishima’s Insertion in the Western Aesthetic Canon Several of the images in Part Four of Barakei, “Divers Desecrations,” feature images of Mishima, juxtaposed against iconic images from the Western aesthetic canon. Some of these images feature Mishima’s body in its entirety, while others focus on his disembodied parts. Hosoe recalled actions, works and certain images in Barakei. The author argues, however, that the “now” in which the 1985 edition of Barakei was published should be considered separately from the timing of Mishima’s death in 1970, or the time when Barakei was first published in 1963. 11 The 1985 version of Barakei does not have page numbers. 12 No black and white photographs appear in the first section.

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Mishima showing him Bernard Berenson’s (1865-1959) The Italian Painters of the Renaissance (1952), as well as several other reproductions of Italian Renaissance paintings (Hosoe 2005, 134).13 Each of the Barakei images discussed below features an image that has been identified in Berenson’s text. 

Mishima’s Gaze The first black and white photograph in Part Four features a close-up of Mishima’s eye, with a rendering of Sandro Botticelli’s (c. 1445-1510) The Birth of Venus (c.1482-6) in the background (Fig. 10-1). 14 In gross vividness reminiscent of Georges Bataille’s (1897-1962) work, this image features details of Mishima’s eye: from the wrinkles in his eyelid to his lush, black eyelashes. Centered on the image of Mishima’s retina—an unnaturally round, black, shiny marble—blood vessels are even seen floating within the cornea. In the background of the image appears Botticelli’s Venus, emanating both from the shell of the painting and the onyx marble of Mishima’s eye. Hosoe notes that for some of the images, he had arranged for the creation of painted backdrops to recreate certain images from the Italian Renaissance (Ibid., 137). Even upon first glance, the reference to Botticelli’s painting is evident. However, as the viewer’s gaze alternates between the Botticelli background and the details of Mishima’s eyeball, she notices that the Botticelli background appears to be a mirror image of the actual Botticelli painting, creating the impression that Hosoe attempted to capture the image of the painted Botticelli as reflected in Mishima’s eye. 15 Therefore, it would seem as if Hosoe wanted to capture the gaze that Mishima directed to his favoured works of art. His intense gaze is simultaneously directed outwards towards the birth of Venus and inwards, providing a vast and deep void from which Venus emanates. 



13



While speculative, perhaps Mishima appreciated the renewed interest in classical antiquity, albeit of the Western tradition, in the Renaissance period. 14 This work is reproduced as Pl. 204 in Berenson’s text. The provenance of the Botticelli painting is listed as the Uffizi Gallery in Florence. 15 In the Botticelli painting, Zephyrs, symbols of spiritual passions who blow Venus towards the shore, are seen on the left-hand side of the painting, and Horae, a goddess of the seasons, who hands Venus a flowered cloak, is seen to the right-hand side of the painting.

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Mishima’s Immaculate Conception The fourth image in Part Four features a large and clear image of the Virgin Mary cradling the infant Jesus (Fig. 10-2). This is Giovanni Antonio Boltraffio’s (c. 1466-1516) Madonna and Child (c. late fifteenth-early sixteenth century). 16 The Virgin’s face is filled with motherly compassion, as she directs her gaze to Jesus. Jesus clings to his mother’s frock, his left hand reaching out towards the comfort of her partially exposed breast. If one focuses one’s gaze merely on the upper half of the image, it would appear to be a representation of the iconic biblical relationship of mother and son. However, the viewer immediately notices that a strange line streaks the Virgin’s face, almost as if she is shedding an electrified tear. As the viewer’s gaze continues from familiar iconic territory to the unknown netherworlds of the Virgin’s bodily centre, the viewer finds Mishima, curled up in the fetal position within Jesus’ folds. Mishima is nestled within the center of the Virgin, severing Jesus’ body. Additionally, Mishima can be viewed through what appears to be the spectre of a ghostly hand, a hand too skeletal and disproportionate to be the hand of the Virgin Mary. As for “Baby Mishima” himself, he appears as an intense black hole of energy. While his face is covered in shadow, his stare is steady and focused. Surrounded by large patches of white, his toned skin appears dark and lustrous, making him appear a mysterious yet solid presence. 



Mishima’s Hubris? The sixth image in Part Four is Pietro Perugino’s (1469-1523) Apollo and Marsyas (c. late fifteenth-early sixteenth century) (Fig. 10-3). 17 In Greek mythology, Marsyas is a satyr that challenged Apollo to a music contest and, having lost the contest, also lost his life. In Perugino’s painting, the viewer sees Marsyas on the left with his flute, perhaps attempting to emulate a tune that Apollo has just played on his lyre. Apollo regally stands on the right, casting a challenging gaze towards Marsyas. Marsyas is often discussed as the embodiment of hubris, or pride leading to one’s demise. In this image, Mishima’s loin-clothed torso is splashed across the image, 

16



This work is reproduced as Pl. 368 in Berenson’s text. The provenance of the Boltraffio Madonna is listed as the National Gallery in London. 17 Ibid., Pl. 304. The provenance of the work by Perugino is listed as the Louvre in Paris.

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physically disrupting the contest between Apollo and Marsyas. 18 In comparison to the image of Mary and Jesus, Mishima’s body in this image is found in the foreground, his skin tone a pale and jarring white. His body appears to ensnare Apollo’s neck, as if Mishima is strangling the young god with his muscular thighs. In this image, Mishima’s body is angled in such a manner that one cannot see his face; his distorted body abruptly breaks off at the neck, his body floating through the air, as if devoid of matter. Perhaps an active challenge to Apollo’s dominancy, or an embodiment of Marsyas’ hubris, Hosoe throws Mishima’s body into the world of the picture. 

Mishima as Actor and Hosoe as Director In his Preface to Barakei, Mishima admitted that he entrusted himself to the skills of Hosoe’s eye and camera. 19 Noting that Hosoe’s work is “mechanical sorcery,” Mishima described Hosoe’s camera as being used “for purposes utterly opposed to civilization” (Preface to Barakei, 1). Mishima claimed little or no control, as he portrayed himself being transported to a world that was “abnormal, warped, sarcastic, grotesque, savage, and promiscuous ... yet there was a clear undercurrent of lyricism murmuring gently through its unseen conduits” (Ibid.). Mishima found this savage, yet gentle world to be in stark contrast to the perceived world that he usually inhabited, a world characterised by the worship of social appearances and morality, which in turn created foul, filthy sewers winding beneath the surface. In their collaboration, Mishima claimed that his spirit became entirely redundant. Subject to Hosoe’s artistic explorations, Mishima became just another object to be captured by Hosoe’s eye and camera. His body—and, by extension, his spirit—was “stripped of [its] various meanings, which [were] flung into a meaningless arrangement where their meaningless 

18

Mishima apparently fixated on other icons as well, including St Sebastian, the Christian saint and martyr who is said to have been killed during the persecution of Christians by Diocletian. Mishima may have been entranced by the young St Sebastian’s naked body, tied to a post and shot through with arrows. While not the subject of this chapter, an interesting comparison can be made between Mishima emulating St Sebastian in the third image of Part Five in the 1985 edition of Barakei, and other images of Mishima emulating St Sebastian. The author is aware of one such photograph taken by Shinoyama Kishin ᜅ՞ધॾ (b. 1940) in 1966, where Mishima posed in the guise of St Sebastian, as painted by Guido Reni (1575-1642) (Shinoyama photograph reproduced in Henry Scott-Stokes). 19 Mishima has noted that he was allowed to “have a pleasant and exceptional experience” and that “above all, he trusts Hosoe’s eye” (Mishima 1963a, 477).

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reflection of each other eventually restore[d] a certain order to the light and shadow” (Ibid., 2). Therefore, the only requirement for Mishima-as-object was an a priori assumption that the body had a meaning of which it could be stripped, as the photographed objects were “consecrated to the uncertain metamorphosis which would surely occur as a result of the ritual situation so assiduously arranged” (Ibid., 3). Allowing Hosoe to undertake such a process of abstraction, Mishima claimed that Hosoe’s exercise achieved “a successful reversion to the kind of primary images already seen in his subconscious world” (Ibid.). Hosoe remarked that he was attempting to create a “destruction of a myth,” and moreover, a “creative process through destruction” (Hosoe 2005, 134). Hosoe allowed the use of tangible objects that Mishima loved or owned in the photographs, as he believed “that the soul of a man resides in his property, and that his spirit is especially evident in the art and the possessions that surround him” (Ibid., 137). However, he is very specific to note that “the interpretation and expression” of such objects was his alone (Ibid., 134).

Photography as Testimony or Record Mishima argued that the task of the photographer is to filter the original essence of the subject of the photograph through the methods of either photographic record or photographic testimony (Preface to Barakei, 3-4). While photography-as-record takes the “absolute authenticity of the object photographed as its form and the purification of the meaning as its theme,” photography-as-testimony allows for the meaning of the objects portrayed by the camera to be “filtered off, while other parts are distorted and fitted into a new environment … as for the theme of the work, it lies solely in the expression of the photographer’s subjective judgment” (Ibid., 4). As a piece of testimony, therefore, photography serves to act as tangible evidence for a supposed truth, with Mishima finding Hosoe’s photography-as-testimony to claim: “This is the true [portrayal of the object] … This is a photograph, so it is as you see: there are no lies and no deceptions” (Ibid., 4). However, this claim to truth is just as constructed as what is the visible end result in the photograph, and while the works are vibrant with a “frail yet intense tremolo of emotion, the emotion of the testimony cannot partake of the slightest objective credibility” (Ibid., 5). What is truthful behind the photograph-as-testimony is the recording of time that the photographer has spent looking at the object. Moreover, Mishima claimed that no matter how much the subject of the photograph is altered through techniques, the photographed object will always convey

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original essence to the viewer. Therefore, in the process of creating Barakei, Mishima entrusted Hosoe to create a visual testimony of Mishima’s personae. Mishima allowed Hosoe to treat his body as an object, alongside the other tangible items indicative of his aesthetic sensibilities, giving Hosoe the opportunity to curate a performative visual representation of Mishima.

Testimony to Mishima’s Personae Mishima specifically claimed that Hosoe’s photography was testimony, and not record, 20 but if this is correct, to what does Barakei testify? Hosoe himself noted that Barakei was a collection of subjective documentary photographs evolving from his own imagination, and that he “must take whole responsibility” for the result (Hosoe 1991, 25). As testimony to an “unrepeatable event,” Hosoe wrote that the main theme of Barakei is life and death, portrayed through Mishima’s flesh and immortal beauty, captured at its peak age of 38 (Ibid., 25). Mishima was reluctant to acknowledge the aging process of his own body; his body “was the battleground where his works were hammered out and his thoughts forged and developed; it was also a high-powered crucible of darkness, emptiness, health, light and death” (Fukushima 1991, 101). In addition to focusing upon Mishima’s body, Hosoe also focused on Mishima’s possessions, as “things possessed by someone sooner or later come to partake of the owner’s spirit” (Ibid., 103). Therefore, Hosoe was attempting to create a testimony to the spirit of Mishima, focusing on his body along with his personal objects. As previously discussed, analyses of Mishima’s life often raise the timing at which the second edition of Barakei was set to have been released, noting the significance of its planned publication just after Mishima committed suicide in the fall of 1970 (Holborn 1983, 54). 21 However, without such analyses, the viewer of the 1985 edition of Barakei has only the visual images and Mishima’s text. Under these circumstances, the viewer senses that she is being introduced to a strong-willed character and is challenged to view Mishima’s world. Mishima stands before the viewer, at times staring the viewer down and at times—deep within the world of the 





20



Interestingly enough, Hosoe claimed that these categories were too narrow. He believed that the medium of photography is capable of infinitely more complicated and subtle forms of expressions. To him, photography can be simultaneously both “a record and a ‘mirror’ or ‘window’ of self-expression” (Hosoe 1991, 7). 21 Holborn also discusses that Mishima’s suicide in 1970 was meticulously staged and rehearsed over the course of the previous decade.

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photograph—testifying to the viewer about his life and philosophy. Mishima remains captured within the pages of Barakei, allowing the viewer a glimpse into a visual representation of Mishima when he was 38 years old.

Did Mishima Have Control? If the above is true, how much control did Mishima have—as the object of Hosoe’s photography—in the production of the images in Barakei? Mishima claimed that words are often inadequate to traverse the gulf between art and action, and only theatre, “where a false blood runs in the floodlights, can perhaps move and enrich people with much more forceful and profound experiences than anything in real life” (Scott-Stokes 1974, 170). Believing in the power of theater, Mishima offered himself as the subject matter for Hosoe’s camera, and thus Barakei might be considered a performance under Hosoe’s direction (Afterword to Barakei). Submitting and entrusting himself to Hosoe’s almost sadistic authority, Holborn claims that the images of Barakei depict Mishima challenging himself with the most severe task of making public his inhabited world (Ibid.). Mishima believed that theatrical and performative actions—actions that best approximate life itself—would overcome the flatness and “impotence of words as abstractions” (Holbon 1983, 55). Allowing Hosoe to curate Mishima and present a visual testimony of him, Mishima permitted Hosoe to uncover his creative epicenter, a “most dangerous, yet vital place” (Afterword to Barakei). This center, while denying Mishima an expressive self, required that Mishima himself be the object of expression. As Hosoe notes, “if it had been someone other than Mishima [occupying that space], such ideas would not have arisen in the first place, and it is unclear whether such ideas arose because it was Mishima … [R]egardless, in a different way, it had to have been Mishima” (Hosoe 1962, 371). The complex and dark world found in Barakei, fantastically surreal and deeply poignant, is a testimony both to Mishima’s spirit and to the creative process between Hosoe and Mishima. 22 

Ur-Portraiture The representations of Mishima in Barakei can be considered a form of ur-portraiture, or a prototypical portrait, speaking to a version of Mishima 22

Mishima observes in Hosoe’s work the symbiotic existence of “an extreme consciousness of artificial creation and a gentle, easily hurt spirit” (Mishima 1962, 15).

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as-he-was-at-age-38. Photography as ur-portraiture is a theme that is common to other contemporary artists of photographic portraiture. For example, Morimura Yasumasa ཤ‫ޘ‬௠࣑ (b. 1951) is a contemporary Japanese photographer who regularly creates self-portraits of himself in the guise of famous characters and personalities, mostly Western and female. 23 In recent times, he has performed in the guise of Mishima himself, creating a 2006 video work to recreate Mishima’s last day in Seasons of Passion/A Requiem: Mishima. In this piece, Morimura delivered an impassioned speech, one based on Mishima’s manifesto. Acting as the subject of his own work while retaining his directorial role; Morimura clearly plays the part of both the photographer and the photographed in his ur-portraits. Morimura’s work is of course different from Barakei, as Morimura performed an identity separate from his own, and retained curatorial control over how he chose to fashion himself. Even though Morimura and Hosoe both focus on Mishima as their subject, Morimura is appropriating a historical moment in Mishima’s time, when Mishima was 45. Morimura recreated this moment based upon secondary sources narrating Mishima’s final day and therefore is one layer removed from Mishima-as-he-was-atage-45. As his work was based on a historical moment that occurred in 1970, Morimura’s work can be considered more of a historical recreation and reinterpretation, continuing in the lineage of a renewed focus on Mishima’s work and person. On the other hand, Hosoe was directing a version of Mishima-as-he-was-at-age-38. While he was not removed by time or space from Mishima, Hosoe had the opportunity to imbue his portraiture of Mishima with more creativity as he explored versions of Mishima’s identity. His curatorial direction was reflected in the choice of Western icons, paintings and accoutrements used to create the images in Barakei. Therefore, Barakei can be considered ur-portraiture of Mishima-as-he-wasat-age-38. 



Mishima’s Spirit Captured Discourse on photography often raises the dual—and, at times, battling—goals of photography, focusing on the photographic judgment as being about either the identification of stereotypes bound by rigid rules (Krauss 1984, 61) or the “deposit of the real itself” (Krauss 1981, 26). In 23

Morimura has fashioned himself as individuals ranging from Diego Velásquez’s (1599-1660) Infanta Margarita to Madonna, the pop singer. For a series of essays decoding his own work, see Morimura Yasumasa, 1996.

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discussing Surrealist photography, Rosalind Krauss argues that the photograph—as a document of “unity as that-which-was-present-at-one-time” (Ibid., 23)—exists to faithfully trace a paradox whereby reality is constituted as a sign. Barakei can be viewed as capturing the paradox that is Mishima’s spirit from two angles: nihilist nationalism and syncretic hybridism.

Nihilist Nationalism In “Divers Desecrations”, Barakei provides a visual trace of Mishima’s ideologies, allowing Mishima, an individual who engaged in same-sex relationships and had nationalist tendencies, to lament the perceived experience of emasculation—both at the personal and at the national level (Starrs 1994, 16). Having experienced Japan’s defeat in World War II and the U.S. Occupation of Japan in the 1950s, Mishima allied his thinking and actions to samurai moralists, kokutai scholars and neo-Confucian revolutionaries of the Tokugawa period (Ibid., 72). In doing so, he found intellectual traditions for his nationalism, martial values, elevation of Emperor-centered State Shinto-ism, and death-centered ethics and aesthetics. Struggling to revive an emasculated Japan, Mishima conflated nihilism with nationalism; while he believed that Japanese people were so unique that no universal system of thought could be used to enhance Japanese nationalism, he was following in the tradition of using foreign ideologies to universal generalisability, and therefore, channeled the nihilism advocated by Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) to bolster his own nationalist views. In arguing for an active form of nihilism in his final address to the Self-Defense Forces during the coup d’etat that led to his ritual suicide, Mishima exhorted the soldiers to rise together and die with him “for the ‘real Japan, the real Japanese, and the real bushi spirit’ that exists nowhere but in the Self-Defense Forces” (Ibid., 74). Mishima’s nationalism and nihilism therefore should not be seen in opposition to one another, but as a way of using nationalism for nihilist purposes. In Barakei, Mishima appeared in Ubermensch-like form, making an appeal to renewed masculinity through the display of his muscular body. Simultaneously, a sense of abject rejection of established order and annihilation of the self pervades Barakei. Allowing himself to become just another object and entrusting himself to Hosoe’s vision, Mishima’s passivity appears to hide his agency in the expressive act.

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Syncretic Hybridism Mishima’s literary works are often noted for their traditionalism, which in considering his nationalist politics, may appear to be a rejection of Westernised modernism. 24 In this rejection, Mishima advocated the return to a form of Japanese society that existed prior to its subjugation to Western influences. However, Mishima also lived in a gaudy Western-style mansion and was open in certain contexts about his homosexual lifestyle, elements of his life through which he “pretended to be Westernized” (Okada 2003, 5). Holborn claimed that the “excesses of [Mishima’s] private environment are a measure of the turmoil of a brilliant man torn between East and West and profoundly disturbed by the mercantile course of his native culture” (Afterword to Barakei). As such, Mishima’s appropriations from an alien and despised culture could be considered his own empowering acts of self-aggrandisement (Starrs 1994, 14). Ever since World War II, certain theorists lament the loss of an “indigenous Japanese culture based on traditional values” (Sanders 2004, 7). However, Japan’s increasing engagement with foreign (and predominantly Western) cultures enhanced Japan’s drive to increase the skills necessary to absorb the West without losing the demarcation between “us” and “them” (Iwabuchi 2002, 58). In fact, the practice of cultural appropriation has become so well accepted that people in Japan “now hold the view that the capacity for absorption and indigenization of foreign cultures is uniquely Japanese” (Ibid.). Given the view that Japanese society has moved away from the simple appropriation of Western culture and created its own unique brand of aesthetics, it is possible to reconceptualize Hosoe’s portraiture of Mishima as a unique syncretic undertaking (Sanders 2004, 7). Hosoe and Mishima reproduced identifiable Western iconography in Barakei, admitting both the strength of the image-as-signifier and the ease with which meaning can be stripped from such an image due to replication. In “Divers Desecrations”, Mishima’s insertion into appropriated images from the Western aesthetic canon is both an act of acceptance and an embrace of the represented ideologies (such as Christian religious ideology and martyr myths), with Hosoe merging Mishima’s perceived aesthetic and cultural values with values represented by Western iconography. Not merely seeking to 

24



Karatani Kǀjin ਲ਼ߣ۩Գ argues that Japanese writers in the 1930s, such as Tanizaki Jun’ichiro ߣസʳ ʳ ᑮԫ૴ʳ (1886-1965), Kawabata Yasunari ՟ጤʳ ൈ‫ګ‬ (1899-1972) and Mishima Yukio were originally Westernised modernists, but turned to traditionalism, not for reasons of nostalgia but because they thought it appeared more avant-garde (Kǀjin 1996, 34).

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challenge the established representational order, Hosoe portrayed Mishima as a syncretic figure; by choosing to portray Mishima as a complex character who “plays” alongside Western images, Hosoe argued that Mishima is a hybrid of signs. In doing so, Hosoe succeeded in capturing Mishima in a moment of time. Mishima as a subject provided Hosoe with an opportunity to encode Mishima’s body with specific and complex subjectivity that both challenged and embraced the Western thought represented by artistic icons.

Conclusion What became a plus in my life? ... What probably became a plus is the great acclaim that [Barakei] received in Germany. Apparently, this strange text commanded all of the positive attention at the Frankfurt International Book Exhibition. I served as the model throughout the entire text, not as an author or anything else, but as one object, so the calculation is that I was able to take as a plus only that amount of critical acclaim I received as a pure object … On the other hand, with respect to minuses, there are so many that I cannot even begin to count. That my everyday words and actions are each minuses and that my existence is entirely a minus are facts that I do not need others to tell me. However, what I have learned about life’s appeal at age 38 is that the human relationships surrounding me have slightly increased in complexity, and this fascinating aspect stems from the fact I cannot pigeonhole people either as foe or friend (Mishima 1963b, 630-1).

Barakei was a project in the “destruction of myth” (Hosoe 2005, 134). However, in having Mishima perform as object-as-subject, Hosoe ironically created yet another Mishima myth. While this visual trove cannot be analysed separately from Mishima’s literary works and the secondary works on Mishima’s life, philosophy and politics, Mishima himself noted that the model in Barakei did not “need to be him necessarily” (Hosoe 1962, 371). Perhaps this comment was made in connection to Mishima’s claim of lack of control in the artistic process; however, Barakei very much remains the collaborative result between Mishima and Hosoe. Hosoe photographed “the person within Hosoe’s concept” (Ibid.)—his conception of Mishima. Whether a nationalistic nihilist or syncretic hybridist, Barakei adds, in a stunning visual presentation, yet another layer to Mishima’s complexity.

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Works Cited Primary Sources Hosoe, Eikoh า‫ۂ‬૎ֆ. 1962. Barakei ni tsuite ᜷᜺٩圵圮圎地, Camera Geijutsu㻃坬垢垪ड़๬, March 1962. In Mishima Yukio Zenshnj㻃 Կ୾‫ط‬ ધ֛٤ႃ, Vol. 39, ed. Tanaka Miyoko ‫ض‬խભ‫ז‬՗ʿ et al., 371. Tokyo: Shinchǀsha. —. 1985. Ba-ra-kei = Ordeal by Roses: Photographs of Yukio Mishima. New York: Aperture. —. 1991. Eikoh Hosoe, Meta. New York: International Center of Photography. —. 1999. Eikoh Hosoe. New York: Aperture. —. 2005. Notes on Photographing Barakei. In Setting Sun: Writings by Japanese Photographers, ed. Akihiro Hatanaka, Yutaka Kanbayashi and Ivan Vartanian, 132-42. New York: Aperture. Mishima, Yukio㻃 Կ୾‫ط‬ધ֛. 1962. Hosoe Eikoh-shi no Ririshizumu— Torareta Tachiba Yori า‫ۂ‬૎ֆ圸垫垫坸坻垡Ёᐽ坓坖圩‫م‬໱坒坔. In Mademoiselle, January 1962 in Mishima Yukio Zenshnj, Vol.32, ed. Tanaka Miyoko, et al., 15. Tokyo: Shinchǀsha. —. 1963a. Barakei Taikenki ᜷᜺٩᫿唔ಖ, Geijutsu Seikatsu㻃ड़๬‫س‬੒, July 1963. In Mishima Yukio Zenshnj, ed. Vol. 32, Tanaka Miyoko, et al., 477. Tokyo: Shinchǀsha. —. 1963b. Shashin-shnj “Barakei” no Moderu o Tsutomete—Purasu/ Mainasu, ’63 㡹టႃό᜷᜺٩ύ圸垣垈垬坜೭坋地Ё垘垪坺/垟坥型 坺’63,㻃Yomiuri Shinbun 儧㥓ᄅፊ, Night edition, December 28, 1963. In Mishima Yukio Zenshnj, Vol. 32, ed. Tanaka Miyoko, et al., 630-1. Tokyo: Shinchǀsha. —. 1971. Shinso-ban “Barakei” in tsuiteʳᄅ僞ठό᜷᜺٩ύ圵圮圎地 (from the 1971 version of Barakei). In Mishima Yukio Zenshnj, Vol. 36, ed. Tanaka Miyoko, et al., 392-3. Tokyo: Shinchǀsha. —. 1982. Preface to Embrace. In Eikoh Hosoe: Photographs 1960-1980. Rochester: Dark Sun Press.

Secondary Sources Berenson, Bernard. 1952. The Italian Painters of the Renaissance. London: Phaidon Press. Fukushima, Tatsuo. 1991. On Eikoh Hosoe. In Eikoh Hosoe, Meta, 99-101. New York: International Center of Photography.

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Holborn, Mark. 1983. Eikoh Hosoe and Yukio Mishima: The Shadow in the Time Machine. In Art Forum International 21, 6: 50-7. —. 1999. In Eikoh Hosoe, 99-101. New York: Aperture. Iwabuchi, Koichi. 2002. Recentering Globalization—Popular Culture and Japanese Transnationalism. Durham: Duke University Press. Karatani, Kǀjin ਲ਼ߣ۩Գ. 1996. Japan as Museum: Okakura Tenshin and Ernest Fenollosa. In Japanese Art after 1945: Scream against the Sky, ed. Alexandra Munroe, 33-9. New York: Harry N. Abrams. Krauss, Rosalind. 1981. The Photographic Conditions of Surrealism. October 19: 3-34. —. 1984. A Note on Photography and the Simulacral. October 31: 49-68. Morimura, Yasumasa ཤ‫ޘ‬௠࣑. 1996. Bijutsu no Kaibǀgaku Kǀgi ભ๬圸 ᇞଳ䝤ᝑᆠ. Tokyo: Heibonsha. Okada, Sumie. 2003. Japanese Writers and the West. New York: Palgrave MacMillan. Nathan, John. 1974. Mishima: A Biography. Boston: Little, Brown. Sanders, Mark, 2004. Reflex Contemporary Japanese Self Portraiture. London: Trolley Limited. Scott-Stokes, Henry. 1974. The Life and Death of Yukio Mishima. New York: Farrar, Strauss and Giroux. Starrs, Roy. 1994. Deadly Dialectics: Sex, Violence and Nihilism in the World of Yukio Mishima. Folkestone: Japan Library. Tucker, Anne Wilkes, et al. 2003. The History of Japanese Photography, New Haven: Yale University Press. Yoshimura, Nobuya, 1982. Preface. In Eikoh Hosoe: Photographs 1960-1980. Rochester: Dark Sun Press.

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Fig. 10-1. Hosoe Eikoh, Barakei, #19, 1962, 1962. Gelatin silver print, variable © Hosoe Eikoh.

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Fig. 10-2. Hosoe Eikoh, Barakei, #22, 1961, 1962. Gelatin silver print, variable © Hosoe Eikoh.

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Fig. 10-3. Hosoe Eikoh, Barakei, #24, 1961, 1962. Gelatin silver print, variable © Hosoe Eikoh.

PART IV CROSS-CULTURAL ENCOUNTERS IN CONTEMPORARY VISUAL CULTURE

CHAPTER ELEVEN UNDERSTANDING THE ART OF CONTEMPORARY CALLIGRAPHY IN CHINA1 SARAH SAU WAH NG

This article examines some key concepts that define and evaluate whether a piece of artwork is Chinese calligraphy, with particular reference to contemporary views and practices under the influence of the West. In this fast-changing world, the globalisation of art is not only driving the development of modern art in China, but also that of classical Chinese calligraphy. The growing interest in Chinese art both in China and the West in recent decades has prompted the emergence of a tremendous number of modern and contemporary calligraphic works in the art market. Despite this, some viewers may wonder about the criteria for identifying calligraphic art in China. For example, should we treat Square Word Calligraphy (New English Calligraphy first introduced in 1996 in New York) by Xu Bing ஊ ٧ (b. 1955) as calligraphy? By studying the history, materiality, function, aesthetics and cultural values of Chinese calligraphy, this paper provides viewers with ways of understanding modern and contemporary calligraphy in China. From an anthropological perspective, the emergence of any new form of calligraphy in China is simply a process of cultural assimilation or acculturation resulting from the cultural impact on the development of this form of art. Some works of modern and contemporary Chinese calligraphy are devoid of classical elements or of the ancient masters’ styles or conventions, but are still considered as Chinese calligraphy. We can explain this phenomenon by using Conrad Phillip Kottak’s theory that cultural 1

I am fortunate to have Bei Shan Tang Foundation providing financial support when I wrote this research paper in Oxford. I am also indebted to Prof. Michael Sullivan and Prof. Craig Clunas for their comments on drafts of this essay, Dr Michelle Huang for inviting me to the East & West: Cross-Cultural Encounters conference and continuously giving me advice on this paper, Mr Lo Kwan-chi and Mr Chong Hiu-yeung for providing photographs for this chapter.

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assimilation is the process of adoption by an individual of some or all aspects of a dominant culture (Kottak 2000, 118), while acculturation is the exchange of cultural features through interaction resulting in either or both groups’ cultural characteristics being altered but remaining distinctive (Ibid., 74). Works like Dreams (2000) by Pu Lieping Խ٨ؓ (b. 1959) and Wei’s Squares (1997) by Wei Ligang ᠿ ‫ م‬ଶ (b. 1964) are examples of contemporary calligraphy showing cultural assimilation. Works like Dreams does not look like a piece of calligraphy but more like a surrealist painting as illustrated by its composition and palette. Wei’s Squares reveals relatively more brushstrokes than Pu’s work. Without any readable Chinese characters in it, Wei’s Squares embraces rich elements of Western art in an abstract style. Whereas these two works look like Western art, Gu Gan ‫ײ‬ե (b. 1942) shows the harmonious combination of Western and Chinese styles in such works as World of Supreme Bliss (1991) and Opening Up (1995). Gu’s innovative works provide a refreshing impression. Despite the influence of Western art, he does not lose the spirit of traditional Chinese calligraphy in his brushwork. This illustrates that the revitalised calligraphy can maintain both Chinese and Western cultural characteristics through the interaction between the different cultures. Having viewed several calligraphic works in different styles, such as those of Shen Yimo ާ ձ ᚈ (1883-1971), Mao Zedong ֻ ᖻ ࣟ (1893-1976), Huang Miaozi ႓્՗ (1913-?), Xu Bing and Gu Wenda ߣ ֮ሒ (b. 1955), no one will deny that greater changes have taken place in Chinese calligraphy in the last sixty years than in the previous millennium (Barrass 2002, 15). Modern Chinese calligraphy has undergone unprecedented changes in structure, form, tools, function and content. Similar to Western art during the French Revolution (1789-99), Chinese art was harnessed to establish and maintain political authority during the Cultural Revolution (1966-76). At the time, the literati and traditional art were suppressed, while only art for political propaganda purposes (e.g. woodcut prints and propaganda posters) was allowed. Calligraphy played a crucial role in the revolutionary art of the 1960s and 1970s and was used as a political weapon to educate and indoctrinate the people. The political and social changes in mid-twentieth century China thus altered the development of modern and contemporary Chinese calligraphy. Calligraphy has been regarded as an art form in China since the first century AD. Chinese texts were first written on objects such as bronzes for religious or ritual purposes. Characters were written in different script types ranging from the oracle-bone script (the earliest type) to the regular or

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standard script (the latest and most common type). These script styles not only developed consecutively, but some appeared simultaneously. For example, the regular script appeared at about the same time as the cursive script in the Han dynasty (202 BC-220 AD). Former script types such as the oracle-bone script existed without being totally replaced by a later type. These script types developed according to the societal needs and were influenced by the ideology and calligraphic theories of the time. For example, Sun Guoting ୪መஅ (courtesy name Qianli ಇ៖, 648-703) wrote: In the past there were trends of [writing characters like] dragon, snake, cloud and dew; types such as tortoise, cane and flower, … the technique sometimes coincides with painting, the skill [which it required] was less complex than in calligraphy (Sun 1987, 1). 2 



From Tang people’s eyes, a script-form which imitated the image of an object was inferior to a non-pictorial script-form as calligraphy occupied a pre-eminent place among visual arts in China and it was regarded as superior to painting. Another major concern is the style of calligraphy, which means the way of expression or writing. It is not limited to any particular script type but focuses on how an individual uses a brush to write in his or her own way. Hence, a character can be presented in different styles. The principal developments of Chinese calligraphy can be seen as four approaches to art, namely “classical, modernist, neo-classical, and avant-garde” (Barrass 2002, 15), although different classifications do exist. Along with these stylistic developments, major improvements include the standardisation of characters, the invention of paper, advances in writing tools, and the reformation of Chinese characters (simplification of Chinese characters) in the twentieth century. Throughout the history of calligraphy in China, (modern) Chinese calligraphy has undergone unprecedented change in its structure, form, tools, function and content. These changes increase the difficulty in the study of modern and contemporary Chinese calligraphy.

2

The original text reads: “༚‫ڶ‬ᚊ๢ႆ᥻հੌΔᚋᦊक़૎հᣊΔ…… ؏௫կॹΔ ՠ᜽ᘃᕠΖ” Translation of sentences, author’s own.

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Some Fundamental Issues in Chinese Calligraphy The reason for rethinking the definition of Chinese calligraphy is prompted by the recent terminology dispute about calligraphy between Korea and China. At present, Korea, China and Japan use the terms shuyi ஼ ᢌ (the art of writing), shufa ஼ऄ (the method of writing) and shudao ஼ሐ (the way of writing) to refer, respectively, to the calligraphy in their countries. Similar to the use of the terms “Allah” and “God”, it is more than a matter of name but closely related to one nation’s culture and traditions. For instance, in the Islamic world, calligraphy in Arabic is called “Khatt ul-Yad Υρ ΍ϝϱΩ” (beautiful writing). The writing techniques and tools used in the Islamic world are different from those used in China. Qur’anic calligraphy is an important aspect of Islamic art because Islamic calligraphy has evolved alongside the religion of Islam and the Arabic language. In Europe, the term “calligraphy” originated from a Greek word and means “beautiful writing”. It has nothing to do with religion or the Qur’an. Calligraphy in the West is different from that in most of the East Asian and Middle Eastern countries because it uses the Roman alphabet and has its own styles and writing systems. Thus, it can be seen that the standardisation of a term used to describe calligraphy in one nation might not adequately reflect the characteristics of its calligraphy. Although calligraphy generally means handwritten correspondence or handwriting, it can generate different meanings when interpreted in different cultural contexts. Nowadays calligraphy is considered a kind of visual arts in China. Chinese calligraphy has its own meaning and unique traditions. It is a piece of beautiful writing executed in an expressive manner with a rich cultural context. Besides its artistic value, calligraphy was originally a form of written language (writing) for communication purposes. Hence, different countries have their own written languages. In spite of the language differences between Japan and Korea, their languages both belong to the Altaic language family, and they both used Chinese characters to write for a long period prior to the development of their own writing systems. Up until now, they still share similar characteristics with Chinese culture, and there are similarities in their conventions and use of Chinese language, especially with respect to Chinese characters. In addition, calligraphy in ancient Korea and Japan was greatly influenced by Chinese calligraphy. Sometimes it is quite difficult to distinguish between Japanese and Chinese calligraphy if it is written in Chinese characters. Due to their shared ideas, it would be more appropriate to view Japanese, Korean and Chinese calligraphy as a single “East Asian” group. If we really have to finely classify a piece of calligraphic work into

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different cultural characters, it seems logical that a work written by Japanese is Japanese calligraphy. However, this kind of categorisation is problematic. If a work is a copy of Chinese calligraphy by a Japanese artist, regardless of the race of the author, the work should be considered Chinese rather than Japanese calligraphy. We cannot name a piece of work solely based on the race of its artist. Instead of using race as a method of classification, the content and cultural contexts of a work itself are more important. Above all, language is a key determinant of the identity of calligraphic work. Therefore, a work created by Jackson Pollock (1912-1956) can be a piece of Chinese calligraphy if Pollock could write Chinese. The nationality or ethnicity of a practitioner does not affect how we perceive the work itself. The issue of identity in modern Chinese calligraphy, specifically that of the avant-garde calligraphic works created during and after the 1985 modernist movement of Chinese calligraphy and which were greatly influenced by Western art, is highly controversial. In China, a master in calligraphy will tell you the difference between calligraphy by Japanese and Chinese through stylistic analysis and his own experience. This practice is similar to the view of a prominent Swiss art critic Heinrich Wölfflin (1864-1945) who stated in his “Principles of Art History” (1915) that each artist has his or her own personal style, and beyond this, there is also a national style, and finally a period style which rises and falls cyclically. 3 Even though the concept of national style and period style in Western art is controversial, calligraphy in modern China was stimulated greatly by Western art and culture. This cultural interaction did enhance the awareness of artists’ own identities, especially in a national level during and after the political upheaval in modern China (the establishment of the Communist government in Mainland China). Apart from the styles of modern and contemporary Chinese calligraphy, aesthetic elements (structure, space and lines), techniques and writing tools are also essential. In Chinese tradition, the brush is a tool used for practicing calligraphy. In the modern era, people use a pen for calligraphy; however, a work written by pen is different from one written by brush as the writing tool has a detrimental effect on the final appearance of the work. In a narrow sense then, only calligraphic works written by brush can be regarded as traditional Chinese calligraphy. Despite the disputes between the classicists and modernists regarding the definition of Chinese calligraphy in the 1990s (Ibid., 78), Chinese artists 

3



For a general idea of the change in styles of Chinese calligraphy in different periods, see Huang 2001.

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have continued to revitalise and revolutionise calligraphy in order to break the convention of calligraphy or tradition. Some artists use various materials to assemble different components to make their works, while others use alternative writing tools rather than brushes. Strikingly, some artists even choose to print their works. No matter what methods they use, the basic criteria should be based on the original meaning of shufa (the method of writing) in China. If it is a collage or a printed work, it is no longer the art of calligraphy because the method of writing is not by brush and by hand. Therefore, works created by computer or printing machine should never be treated as a piece of calligraphy. Furthermore, the concept of calligraphy in China is integrated with the writing process. The work itself, its content and meanings are all inter-dependent. The writing process and the work itself is well explained by the term shufa as discussed above. It includes the use of writing tools and the way of writing (by hand rather than by machine). The content and meanings of a calligraphic work are significant in distinguishing between one culture and the other. In China, one prerequisite for participating in the national calligraphy exhibition is that the works need to be written in hanzi ዧ‫( ڗ‬Chinese). It is a challenge for modernist calligraphers because some of them choose not to write in Chinese but convey their meanings through pictorial resemblances of a physical object. Alternatively, some artists simply use lines or symbols to convey their artistic meanings. The form of Chinese characters is a major consideration in contemporary Chinese calligraphy. The list of Simplified Chinese characters had been introduced twice before the Communist Party took over China in 1949. 4 Despite facing strong opposition and previous failure, the Chinese Communist Party brought up the issue of the simplification of Chinese characters again and promulgated it in 1956. This policy was later called the Hanzi Jianhua Fang’an ዧ‫ڗ‬១֏ֱூ (the First Round (Scheme) of Simplified Chinese Characters). As the name explains, it intended to replace the existing Traditional Chinese characters in order to make the written language easier to learn and more accessible to the general public. Regardless of any political ideology behind this policy, some people question whether a work written in Simplified Chinese characters is an orthodox work of Chinese calligraphy. Chinese calligraphers have different 



4 The first list of simplified characters was announced in 1935, but it was forced to stop because it faced much opposition and China suffered from Japan’s invasion. The revised list of simplified characters was released in the mid-1950s. See Zhao 2008, 28-40, 41-5; Zhou 2004, 21-44.

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views on this issue. For those who argue that works written in Simplified Chinese should not be considered or classified in the same way as those written in traditional Chinese, their opposition is concerned with the loss of the cultural context of the characters. Those who deny that works written in Simplified Chinese can be considered Chinese calligraphy are concerned with the rich cultural background of Traditional Chinese characters, which the Simplified Chinese characters lack. However, some simplified characters actually have a very long history and have been used as common words since the tenth century, as for example, dong “ࣟ” in Traditional Chinese character and “䢕” in Simplified Chinese, meaning the east, the direction corresponding to the eastward cardinal compass point. Despite views to the contrary, it has become a common practice to use Simplified Chinese characters in writing in modern China. The use of Simplified Chinese characters in practicing calligraphy throughout the second half of the twentieth century saw this unacceptable form of writing a common practice. Supporters argue that the use of Simplified Chinese characters is like the emergence of different styles of calligraphy (regular script, clerical script and running script) which is part of the development of written Chinese. The use of Simplified Chinese characters can also be viewed as equivalent to a type of styles in a specific period. Therefore, calligraphic works in Simplified Chinese characters are still regarded as examples of Chinese calligraphic art. However, there are those who express concern about the loss of the ancient Chinese spirit in modern and contemporary Chinese calligraphy. Nowadays, the language used in calligraphic works is no longer wenyan wen ֮ߢ֮ (classical Chinese) but is usually replaced by baihua wen ‫ػ‬ᇩ ֮ (vernacular Chinese). This is the result of the modern simplification movement which grew out of efforts to popularise written Chinese in the early twentieth century. Although the use of wenyan wen in calligraphy is symbolic and denotes the longstanding history of literati culture in China, the use of baihua wen is associated with modern Chinese culture. Visually, the style has much in common with its classical counterpart as they both use Chinese characters. For non-Chinese readers, the difference between the two is not noticeable. It is all about the use of language and its content. As long as a work is written in Chinese, it is just a matter of the style of the different time. A work will give the same meaning and possess the same powerful cultural context if the content is the same. Wenyan wen and baihua wen are undoubtedly different use of language. However, they both use Chinese characters to communicate in a written form. Thus, no conflict arises from considering works written in baihua wen as Chinese calligraphy.

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At present, some craftsmen use coloured ink instead of ink to write calligraphy and sell their works as souvenirs to tourists (Fig. 11-1). Strictly speaking, these works can only be classified as Chinese folk art or commercial art rather than Chinese calligraphy. Most of them are highly decorative and look more like paintings. The content is usually someone’s name or a proverb, but they look like pictograms. This type of work is more down to earth and looks more pleasing for the general public as it is easy to read and understand. Nevertheless, the discrepancy between a highly educated intellectual and a less trained craftsman would suggest the different levels of artistic and cultural values in their calligraphic works. The aesthetic value of the “pictogram” seems to be overwhelmed by its utility and commercial value. With the strong commercial properties of this type of calligraphic work for tourists, it is hardly surprising that the artistic value is not up to the standard of being regarded as calligraphic art in China. In a broader sense, the criteria to define the art of calligraphy in China are not limited to the styles, techniques, or the type of Chinese characters the calligraphers use, but also to the cultural meaning and aesthetic value embodied in their works.

Government Interference and Cultural Impact on the Development of Chinese Calligraphy In a narrow sense, in the past the legitimacy of the styles of calligraphy, and the representations of one’s moral quality and perceptiveness in the art of calligraphy had greater symbolic significance than they do at present. These are the intrinsic qualities deeply rooted in the tradition of calligraphy in China, but may no longer be applicable in modern and contemporary Chinese calligraphy, which emphasises innovation. An example of this is the modern Chinese calligraphy written by the former Chinese Communist leader Mao Zedong and other political leaders. They paid relatively less attention to the conventions of writing, such as from right to left and top to bottom. Chairman Mao, for example, developed his talent for calligraphy in circumstances different from those of his former counterparts. He maintained the cultural values of his generation. As everything was in short supply when he was growing up during war time, he did not have the full panoply of writing tools (brushes) or enough of the quality paper used by serious calligraphers. Mao was greatly affected by the conventional way of writing: from left to right, which was revealed in the shape of his horizontally distorted characters (Fig. 11-2). Some later modern calligraphers did not even follow the traditional rule of writing characters in regular

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columns, but displayed their words on the paper in a freer artistic arrangement (Fig. 11-3). Besides, Mao exhibited a strong personal style in his calligraphic pieces. He broke the tradition by not adding a seal after his signature, which differed from the practice of the literati in Ming (1368-1644 AD) and Qing (1644-1911 AD) China. His calligraphic works reveal more about his attitudes and moods due to his personal style. Many of Mao’s subordinates followed his style, also omitting a seal after their signatures (Barrass 2002, 106). In China, a man had to be both educated and cultured in order to gain respect. However, this was not the case during the Cultural Revolution despite the fact that calligraphy was used as a political tool for propaganda for the masses (Kraus 1991, 96-108). The viewers of Chinese calligraphy were no longer limited to the literati or highly educated people, but encompassed the masses. Changes in the political system and environment triggered a transformation in the nature of Chinese calligraphy. The nature of the elite aspect of Chinese calligraphy disappeared. Mao Zedong used calligraphy both as a source of solace and as an attribute of power. He surpassed all his predecessors and moulded the art of calligraphy into a potent instrument of political will. The art of calligraphy was no longer for the sake of art in this period of government suppression and interference. In 1976, the end of the Cultural Revolution not only marked an entirely new stage in modern Chinese history but also in the history of Chinese art. In the post-Cultural Revolution era, calligraphy, like other arts in China, was no longer dominated by a central political authority. Despite decades of censorship, the urge for practitioners to “catch up” with the West prompted the art of calligraphy to continue to develop. The art historian and artist Wu Hung points out that “Chinese art has emerged as a constant interaction and negotiation between five traditions or realms” (Wu 2005, 29). The five realms are: 1) a highly politicised official art directly under the sponsorship of the party; 2) an academic art that struggles to separate itself from political propaganda by emphasising technical training and higher aesthetic standards; 3) a popular urban visual culture that eagerly absorbs fashionable images from surrounding cultures; 4) avant-garde art that consciously ties to various forms of Western modernist and postmodernist art; and 5) an international commercial art eventually devoting itself to an international art market after finding sponsorship from non-government sources. Even though some realms that Wu mentioned overlapped with each other (e.g. nos. 3, 4 & 5), the main argument is that the government influence was lessened and eventually replaced by the environment and Western cultures. From the early 1980s, Western art was re-introduced to China through reproductions and exhibitions. Many theoretical works such as by Heinrich

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Wölfflin and the French philosopher Jacques Derrida (1930-2004) were translated and published in China within a short period of time. This information explosion inspired a tremendous number of artists, in particular, the younger generation. The First Chinese Modern Calligraphy Exhibition held at the National Art Museum of China in Beijing in 1985 marked the birth of the art of modern Chinese calligraphy. Exhibits included works by Zhang Ding ്պ (b. 1917), Huang Miaozi, Wang Xuezhong ‫׆‬ᖂ٘ (dates unknown), Wang Naizhuang ‫׆‬ԯ᪾ (b. 1962), Li Luogong ‫ᙻޕ‬ֆ (1917-1991), Gu Gan, Ma Chengxiang ್ࢭบ (dates unknown), Zhu Naizheng ‫ڹ‬ԯ‫( إ‬dates unknown), Xie Yun ᝔ճ (dates unknown) and others. Subsequently, the modern calligraphy movement continued and Chinese avant-garde art appeared in around 1988. The young avant-gardists tended to be much more inspired by Abstract Expressionism of the 1950s and 1960s and other movements of Western art. This greatly upset the conventions of Chinese calligraphy. Many Chinese calligraphers, such as Huang Miaozi, adopted contemporary Japanese calligraphy in which they used few words and simple lines to express their ideas. Some artists, including Gu Gan, applied styles and theories of Western art in their calligraphic works, while Wang Dongling ‫( ᤿מ׆‬b. 1945) produced painterly calligraphy, which was developed in a compositional form that was closer to painting than to Chinese characters. Both artists had a breakthrough in their creation and expression of calligraphy, but the latter emphasised the link between abstraction and Chinese calligraphy. However, much of the Westernised calligraphic works made during the 1980s lack the “original historical significance” and is disconnected from traditional calligraphy. The prestigious position that Chinese calligraphy had long maintained was altered or even threatened. This is exemplified by contemporary Chinese artists such as Zhang Dawo ്Օ‫( ݺ‬b. 1943), Pu Lieping, Wei Ligang, Wang Nanming ‫׆‬ত✭ (b. 1962) and Zhang Qiang ്ൎ (b. 1962) who have rejected legibility as a criterion for calligraphy. Wang Nanming exhibited sheets of writing, rejected and crumpled up into balls, symbolising his critique of calligraphic practice as a mechanism for social control. Wei Ligang, for instance, drew scratchy, tremulous lines in large square forms suggesting “traditional character practice paper”, which trailed or floated across the paper, often with small areas painted in colours. Zhang Qiang created a method, entitled “traceology”, in which he enlisted a female partner to move the paper as he wrote characters blindly. The artist did not care about the final written works, but rather, was concerned with the production process. He considered the writing process a kind of yin-yang dialectic of construction and destruction.

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Like Xu Bing and Gu Wenda who work outside the limits of tradition in order to find ways of expressing themselves, Qiu Zhijie ५‫( ࣧݳ‬b. 1969) uses the calligraphic mark to challenge the conventions of the art world, its aesthetics and permanence. The main difference in these artists’ works is the way of incorporating the body into the artwork as a ritualised performance. The documentation itself is effective as a critique of art conventions, offering postmodern understanding of the concepts of permanence and beauty, for example, the reception of art in the East and West by Mark Tobey (1890-1976). In Qiu Zhijie’s The Interface series (1999-2000), he transferred the patterns from an engraved bamboo mat onto a human skin. In creating a work that was temporal, he rebelled against the tradition of metal and stone carving. In using the body, he also presented an ambiguous layering of the sensual and the lyrical, both disturbing and subversive to the conventions of ancient Chinese calligraphy. Another work of Qiu Zhijie entitled Writing the “Preface to the Orchid Pavilion” One Thousand Times was created in 1998. Qiu did what a student of calligraphy usually does when learning calligraphy; he copied model calligraphy of a famous fourth-century master. He repeatedly copied the words onto a piece of paper which eventually became an unreadable black sheet. By doing this repetitive process, he embedded the characters in the memory of his hands, arms and brain. It is innovative that he emphasised the process of creation rather than the resulting work. As there is no such concept (process vs. product) in traditional Chinese calligraphy, Qiu Zhijie’s work is a performance rather than calligraphy. Nowadays, in China, some calligraphers practice calligraphy in public spaces and their works have become known as “street calligraphy” (Fig. 11-4). They use large brushes with water instead of ink to write on the ground. Some of them use both hands and even their mouth to hold the brush. After the water evaporates, the words disappear without a trace. Apart from demonstrating “street calligraphy”, practicing calligraphy in the public space is treated as a performance. In China, it is quite common for important figures or calligraphers to practice calligraphy on special occasions. The process of writing has become increasingly as important as a completed work. Although the notion of calligraphy as a performance is not new in China, the reduction of attention and, even sometimes, the disregard of final calligraphic work was a lot more prominent than ever. We rarely find any ancient texts mentioning the process of writing, but rather, they comment on the forms, the brushstrokes of calligraphy, and the personality of calligraphers. The emphasis on the process of creation in Chinese calligraphy only applies in the contemporary world that is probably

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inspired by the concept of performance art in the West. This new trend in the world of calligraphy in contemporary China is definitely new. Without understanding this distinction, it is difficult to evaluate and accept contemporary calligraphy.

Kitsch or Masterpiece? Avant-garde art has remained controversial ever since its emergence in the 1980s. Despite the seminal work of Gu Wenda with his “monumental pseudo-characters” of the mid-1980s, the movement really began with the exhibition of Xu Bing’s Book from the Sky (1988) (Fig. 11-5), an installation of four books in a set of traditional woodblock-printed books of invented non-sense characters that cannot be read. A few people consider his work a simple play on the well-known Chinese concept that Heaven first gave mankind characters that could only be understood by those with divine powers. Others, however, interpret Xu Bing’s work as a negation of Chinese bureaucracy, history and literature. A few even think that Xu’s work is an affront to Chinese culture and its writing system with its long history (Silbergeld and Ching 2006, 105). The debate was finally reframed by Zhang Qiang in 1995. He argues that if a painting without a representational image can be a painting, then calligraphy without readable characters can be calligraphy. He points out that it was possible to create effects with Chinese brushes, inks and papers that could not be matched by those used in Western art (Ibid., 23). Even unreadable calligraphy could have a deep cultural impact and make statements conveying the artist’s views in his time. It is not kitsch, but on the contrary, a creative calligraphic work. Apparently, the invented pseudo-Chinese characters of Xu Bing, including his later work Square Word Calligraphy, are without meaning in terms of the characters themselves. However, a more inherited meaning is deeply rooted in Chinese culture beyond the characters: the retrospect of the Chinese writing system and Chinese characters. Xu claims that he was inspired by the reformation of the Chinese writing system during the 1950s when Traditional Chinese characters were replaced by simplified characters. During the reformation, there were subsequent changes in Chinese characters. Thus, people needed to learn the new characters and forget the past or the former changes. In some cases, confusion is caused by simplified and Traditional Chinese characters sharing the same form. This happens especially in names, for example, hou ‫ ٿ‬can be interpreted as a simplified or traditional Chinese character. In Traditional Chinese character, it either means queen

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(‫ )ٿ‬or after (৵). If it is part of a name in Simplified Chinese characters, we do not know which one is the accurate traditional character conversion. In the simplification process, some Traditional characters were transformed into a character with similar pronunciation, while some lack their own unique meaning descending from the ancient past. Some Chinese characters even share new meanings with other different characters. Nevertheless, this change in the writing system is part of the Chinese history which conveys certain meanings in the history of Chinese calligraphy. Even though some people have found a few ancient Chinese words in Xu Bing’s invented characters, Xu’s characters carried no meaning individually when they were created. Then, what was his true purpose in creating them? Xu stated, it represents “the meaninglessness of the printed word in an authoritarian society that could be Fetish or any instance dictated by the culture in power”. 5 He did not create any specific meaning to each character but beholders may add their own perception and meanings to it. It is similar to what French literary critic Roland Barthes (1915-1980) said, “the author is dead” (Barthes 1977). Once the work has been created, it is beyond the control of the author. In fact, my view is that whether a piece of work is calligraphy or not, it should not be determined by the author and beholders. There should be a set of objective rules like laws to define it so as to avoid any inconsistencies. One might argue that if we accept a work written in Simplified Chinese characters as a piece of calligraphy, then there is no reason to criticize Xu’s invented characters which were made based on the roots of original Chinese characters. Even after the standardisation of Chinese characters in the Qin dynasty (221-206 BC), many alternative characters with the same meaning, called yitizi ฆ᧯‫ڗ‬, existed and were used in the post-Qin period. Yitizi means a character with the same pronunciation and similar meaning but in different forms. In fact, not every yitizi has a written record of its meaning and usage; thus, these characters are only readable by specialists. To a certain extent, they are all unreadable. Some yitizi were incorrect characters when they first emerged, but were eventually accepted and recognised as yitizi. This practice is called yueding sucheng પࡳঋ‫ګ‬, which means “established by usage or accepted through common practice”. Then, why not view Xu’s invented characters and yitizi similarly and treat them as the art of calligraphy? However, as discussed in the definition of the art of Chinese calligraphy 

5



This view from Xu Bing was provided by Prof. Michael Sullivan when he interviewed with the artist in around the 1990s. Prof. Sullivan kindly shared this with me on 4 May 2011.

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in the previous paragraphs, one of the basic rules to distinguish a calligraphic work is whether the work is written in hanzi. This was a compromise conclusion reached by official calligraphic associations, calligraphers and institutions after a series of discussions and studies in Mainland China during the 1980s. Although Xu Bing’s invented characters might eventually become legible, his works cannot be classified as the art of calligraphy at this point until his invented words carry meaning and are readable. Due to its high aesthetic value, it might be considered as an artwork or an installation rather than a calligraphic work.

Conclusion If we do not accept Square Word Calligraphy or invented pseudo-characters as Chinese calligraphy, does it mean that the definition of the art of calligraphy remains the same as it was in the past? If this is the case, there will be no space for the art of calligraphy to develop further. Calligraphy in China has its longstanding history and traditions which are not easy to change within a decade in spite of the influx of Western cultures and the political upheaval of previous centuries. However, the global commercial art market and Western ideology are changing the perception of the art of calligraphy, in particular, modern and contemporary calligraphy in China as reflected in the painterly style, the abstract expressionist calligraphy and the performance nature of practicing calligraphy. All of these changes are unprecedented in the history of Chinese calligraphy. The new forms of calligraphic composition and contemporary ways of representation break through the limits and constraints of traditional Chinese calligraphy, despite some calligraphers continuing to focus more on the intellectual and linguistic levels. With regard to art for the sake of politics, not all contemporary calligraphers in China are concerned with social commentary or existential meditation. However, contemporary Chinese calligraphy is unavoidably affected by Western cultures, especially in the 1980s, and places more emphasis on the process of creation and the audience. The viewer of calligraphy is no longer limited to Chinese readers, but extends to people from different racial and cultural backgrounds. Similarly, untrained artists can also produce important works of cultural significance. Like the early graffiti works of the British street artist Banksy (b. 1975), the “street calligraphy” of Tsang Tsou-choi མ޾ತ (also known as “Kowloon King”; 1921-2007) in Hong Kong (Fig.11-6) has long been

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neglected and under-valued in previous decades. 6 Although the artistic value of Tsang’s works is still controversial, they are now collected by the Hong Kong Museum of Art and are regarded as modern art. Nevertheless, as history repeats itself, the discourse and trend in the direction of Chinese calligraphy moves back and forth like a swing between the tradition and innovation. The art of calligraphy has already been developing in this pattern since its inception. The two co-exist and supervise the development of each other. They work like political parties with opposite views, restraining each other from remaining stagnant. For example, in recent years, there has been a revival in traditional calligraphy in China and the development of contemporary calligraphy is slowing down. Under the global art market, more calligraphers realise the importance of retaining their traditional and cultural elements in their works so as to distinguish theirs from other globalised art. Instead of simply following the traditional styles and calligraphy convention, some calligraphers present their calligraphy through innovative structure, displays and new media, such as the calligraphy of a famous young calligrapher Chui Pui Chee ஊު հ (b. 1980) (Fig. 11-7). This seems to be the present trend of how traditional calligraphy is received in the twenty-first century and it will probably remain so in the near future. 

6



In a press release of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) Government, it reported a minute of the Legislative Council Meeting on 13 January 2010 about Mr Tsang Tsou-choi’s ink writing. In this press release on the Government website, it stated that “the general public have diverse views on the ink writing left by Mr Tsang Tsou-choi in public places and use different terms to describe it ranging from graffiti, calligraphic works, Chinese brush-writing, or simply calligraphy. The term ‘ink writing’ is a general description of Chinese brush-writing works. In view of the much divided views on the artistic merits of Mr Tsang’s ink writing, we consider ‘ink writing’ an objective description.” From this, we know that the question of whether Tsang’s calligraphic works can be regarded as the art of calligraphy is still controversial. See HKSAR Government 2010. Not until recent years, graffiti of Banksy and Tsang are re-valued and recognised. For example, Bristol’s City Museum and Art Museum held an exhibition of Banksy in 2010, while Tsang’s works were displayed at the exhibition of “The Pride of China Exhibition” at the Hong Kong Museum of Art in 2007 and his solo exhibition of “Memories of King Kowloon” at the Island East, Hong Kong in 2011. For a detailed study of Banksy, see Banksy 2006; Wright 2009; Bull 2008; Kuittinen 2010. As for Tsang’s, see Clarke 2000; Chung 2011.

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Works Cited Primary Sources Banksy. 2006. Wall and Piece. London: Century. Sun, Guoting ୪መஅ. 1987. Shupu xu ஼ᢜ‫( ݧ‬Preface to the Treatise on Calligraphy). Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe.

Secondary Sources Barrass, Gordon S., and The British Museum. 2002. The Art of Calligraphy in Modern China. Berkeley: University of California Press. Barthes, Roland. 1977. The Death of the Author. In Image, Music, Text, ed. and trans. Stephen Heath, 101-6. New York: Hill. Bull, Martin. 2008. Banksy Locations & Tours. London: Shell Shock. Chung, Joel ᝻ᗊᏘ. 2011. Kowloon King. Hong Kong: Asia One Product & Publishing Limited. Clarke, David. 2000. The Culture of a Border within: Hong Kong Art and China. Art Journal 59, 2: 89-101. Huang, Dun ႓൮. 2001. Zhongguo shufa shi խഏ஼ऄ‫׾‬, 5 Vols. Jiangsu: Jiangsu jiaoyu chubanshe. Kottak, Conrad Phillip. 2000. Cultural Anthropology. Boston and London: McGraw-Hill. —. ,QWURGXFFLyN a la $QWURSRORJta Cultural (Spanish Text). Madrid: McGraw-Hill. Kraus, Richard Curt. 1991. Brushes with Power: Modern Politics and the Chinese Art of Calligraphy. Berkeley and Oxford: University of California Press. Kuittinen, Riikka. 2010. Street Art: Contemporary Prints. London: Victoria & Albert Museum. Leung, Simon, Janet A. Kaplan, Wenda Gu, Xu Bing and Jonathon Hay. 1999. Pseudo-Languages: A Conversation with Wenda Gu, Xu Bing, and Jonathon Hay. Art Journal 58: 86-99. Liu, Zongchao Ꮵࡲ၌. 2001. Zhongguo shufa xiandai shi: chuantong de yanxu yu xiandai de kaituo խഏ஼ऄ෼‫׾ז‬: ႚอऱ࢏ᥛፖ෼‫ז‬ऱၲ ࢷ. Hangzhou: Zhongguo meishu xueyuan chubanshe. Silbergeld, Jerome, and Dora C. Y. Ching. 2006. Persistence/ Transformation: Text as Image in the Art of Xu Bing. Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press Wright, Steve. 2009. Home Sweet Home: Banksy’s Bristol: The Unofficial

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Guide. Bristol: Tangent Books. Wu, Hung ‫ݥ‬ព, Amy Teschner, Art David and Alfred Smart, et al. 2005. Transience: Chinese Experimental Art at the End of the Twentieth Century. Rev. ed., Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Zhao, Shouhui. 2008. Planning Chinese Characters: Reaction, Evolution or Revolution? Dordrecht: Springer. Zhou, Minglang, and Sun Hongkai. 2004. Fifty Years of Script and Language Reform in the PRC. In Language Policy in the People’s Republic of China: Theory and Practice since 1949, ed. John S. Rohsenow, 21-44. Boston: Kluwe.

Internet Sources HKSAR Government. 2010. LCQ12: Mr Tsang Tsou-choi’s Calligraphy. http://www.info.gov.hk/gia/general/201001/13/P201001130222.htm (assessed January 13, 2010).

Understanding the Art of Contemporary Calligraphy in China Fig. 11-1. Colourful calligraphy as souvenir.

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Fig. 11-2. Mao Zedong, Renmin ribao πԳ‫ֲا‬໴ρʳ(People’s Daily), the name of a newspaper in Mainland China.

Fig. 11-3. Gu Gan, Calligraphic work for a label of the French wine Château Mouton Rothschild, 1996. Photograph courtesy of Chong Hiu-yeung.

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Fig. 11-4. Street calligraphy in Beijing, China.

Fig. 11-5. Xu Bing, inside page of Book from the Sky, 1988. Courtesy of the collection of Prof. Michael Sullivan, Oxford. Photograph by Sarah Ng.

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Fig. 11-6. Tsang Tsou-choi, calligraphy in Kwun Tong, Hong Kong. Photograph courtesy of Lo Kwan-chi.

Fig. 11-7. Chui Pui Chee, Running Script of Su Shi Poem, 2010. Ink on canvas. 120 x 620 x 8cm. © Courtesy of the artist.

CHAPTER TWELVE TRANSNATIONAL OTAKU CULTURE: A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF ANIME FANS IN THE U.S. AND IN TAIWAN PEI-TI WANG

Japanese anime, 1 manga 2 and games 3 are largely recognised all over the world, and there are many anime fans in the countries outside Japan, including the United States, Europe and other Asian countries. I consider these overseas anime fans as “transnational otaku”. In my own definition, otaku—the passionate fans of anime, manga and games—not only consume anime-related products, but also play with the images and contents of the anime, remix them, and create something new out of them. In some degree, such activities are related to a concept called moe, a kind of affective feelings toward certain anime character traits or elements, which I will discuss further in the following. I argue that the concept of moe is as the becoming-conscious expression of affect. The idea of affect, as the “power to act,” is not equal to emotion but “bodily intensity” that takes place without consciousness (Massumi 2002, 28). Thus, it can motivate otaku to participate fandom activities and circulate images and contents. However, due to various understanding and interpretation of moe among these transnational otaku, their fandom activities may result differently. Drawing on interviews and observations in Taipei and New York City, this paper investigates the consumption patterns of transnational otaku. I will examine the different consumption and reproduction patterns of transnational otaku, based on their understanding of moe, which can be linked to the pre-conscious bodily responses, or “affects”. 

1











Anime (pronounced as ah-ni-mei)—the abbreviation of “animation” in Japan— refers to all kinds of worldwide animation. However, in other countries, the term “anime” only refers to the “animation originated from Japan”. In this paper, I use the term “anime” referring to Japanese animation only. 2 Manga is a Japanese word for comics or graphic novels. 3 In this paper, “games” refers to Japanese video games.

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This research begans with ethnographic observations in fandom events such as New York Anime Festival and anime meetups in New York City since 2007, and doujinshi 4 conventions in Taipei in summer 2008. In-depth interviews had been followed up from 2008 to 2009 in Taipei and in New York City. 



Two Case Studies: Taipei and New York City On a weekday afternoon, a young man, Bai, walked into a doujinshithemed café located near the Taipei Train Station. He wore a blue blazer with a red necktie which seemed too formal for a student. But I later found out that his dress is a costume from a Japanese video game ef-a tale of memories. 5 Meanwhile, Bai was listening to its soundtrack with his MP3 player. He was a big fan of this game and two café staff members and several customers said hello to him when he walked in. He seemed to know them well and walked towards his usual corner immediately, sat down, and made himself at home. Then, he started chatting with another young man. Their topics of discussion ranged from video games and weaponry designs, to fighting bishoujo—beautiful young girls who carried weapons for fighting. He showed me the pictures that he drew, including pictures of girls wearing school uniform tops and sexy panties, as well as girls wearing military suits with guns or other kinds of weapons. He loves to draw pictures of bishoujo (literally, beautiful young girls). He has published doujinshi and has attended several anime conventions to sell his own works. He hopes to become a professional illustrator in the future. The owner of this doujinshi-themed café, Sue, is a senior doujinshi artist. In 2007, she published a book on how to make doujinshi and opened a themed café in order to provide a friendly space for doujinshi lovers. Indeed, her customers were mostly doujinshi artists and fans. The café was decorated with many posters of anime and manga. Wall-mounted 

4



Doujinshi—a Japanese term for “fanzines”—are self-published art works in forms of novels, manga, anime, music, or games by fans. Doujinshi are usually sold at anime-related conventions, specialised bookstores and online shops. According to Media Create, doujinshi sales made up 14.9% of the whole otaku industry in 2007. See Media Create 2007, 18. 5 The behaviour of wearing costumes of anime and game characters is called “cosplay”, short for “costume play”. It is a type of performance art in which participants make or purchase costumes and accessories and dress themselves as a specific character of anime, manga or games. Ef-a tale of memories is the title of a Japanese video game series which has also been adopted into TV anime programs.

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bookshelves were filled with all kinds of manga and doujinshi she purchased from doujinshi bookshops in Tokyo and conventions in Taiwan. As for anime fans in the United States, one of the oldest anime groups in the New York area, Metro Anime, 6 held anime screenings regularly at Maui Tacos restaurant on Fifth Avenue, next to the Empire State Building in Manhattan, New York City. On one Sunday afternoon, in the basement of the restaurant, there was a dark room with people watching anime videos on a big screen. They were watching Ouran High School Host Club, a Japanese school-comedy-romance anime TV series, which was just broadcasted in Japan a couple of weeks ago. The videos were originally in Japanese and subtitled in English by fans, which were called fansubs. 7 There were about twenty to twenty-five people in attendance at this screening, each paying US$2 for the space rental. The screening usually takes place on the third Sunday every month. The members of Metro Anime come from the metropolitan area in New York City, with different nationalities, races, genders, and ages. They passionately participated in all kinds of anime activities in New York. For instance, they held panels in the New York Anime Festival at the Javits Convention Center annually since 2007. They also coordinated some programmes with the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art and the Kinokuniya Bookstore in New York City. They maintain the communication and operation of their organisation via online mailing lists. These two examples show how Japanese anime, manga and video games have globalised in other countries outside Japan, both in the East and West. They also indicate the phenomenon of transnational otaku, the worldwide anime fandom communities, and how the passionate fans consume and reproduce anime products by practicing cosplaying, making doujinshi or fansubs, and participating in conventions and other relevant events. The term otaku was originally a Japanese honorific second-person pronoun, i.e., a polite form of “you” or “your family”. In the 1980s, the term otaku was used frequently among groups of science fiction and anime fans to address each other, and gradually became a common slang referring to passionate and obsessive mania of anime, manga and games. Thereafter, the meanings of otaku in various countries become slightly different. In this paper, I refer otaku to those people with obsessive interests in anime, manga or games and they voluntarily do fandom activities such as cosplaying, 





6



Metro Anime is an anime club that was founded in 1995. Since then, its members have communicated with each other via mailing list. See Metro Anime Website. 7 A fansub, short for “fan-subtitled”, is the subtitle of foreign video which was translated by fans and subtitled into a foreign language based on the original script.

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fansubbing, doujinshi-making, and fan-made videos. Otaku participate in these voluntary activities out of their affections, but their practices might vary in different countries. For example, cosplaying is more casual and informal in the United States than in Japan and Taiwan, while doujinshi is more popular in Japan and Taiwan than in the United States. In Japan, anime and manga were rapidly developed and mass produced after World War II. At first, it was deeply influenced by American popular culture. The Japanese anime and manga artist, Tezuka Osamu ֫Ⴢएۧʳ (1928-1989), learned about the techniques of Walt Disney’s animation and Hollywood films and produced modern manga and anime in various styles. The new production methods help anime companies in Japan to produce anime more efficiently and cost-effectively. Unlike the children-oriented Disney cartoons, Tezuka inserted more themes in the storylines, such as issues of war and peace, life and death, technology and humanity. Thus, in Japan, anime and manga always target at audiences from different generations. Anime, manga and games, along with light novels, 8 films, mini-figures, drama radio CDs and soundtracks, are products relating to each other. They form a multi-media industry in terms of “image alliances” (Shiraishi 1997, 236), the “manga industrial complex” (Pink 2007) and others. In Japan, manga publication comprises more than 20% of all printed materials (Ibid.). Anime industry is one of the major industries and exports of Japan in the early twenty-first century. Japan’s largest consulting company, Nomura Research Institute (NRI,ʳມ‫ޘ‬䆯‫ٽ‬ઔߒࢬ), conducted a survey in 2004 on Japanese otaku in five major categories: manga, anime, games, idols and PC assembly. NRI reported that “the total number of enthusiastic consumers, known as otaku, in Japan is estimated to be 2.85 million with a market size of 290 billion yen” (Kitabayashi 2004). With reference to a more recent report by Media Create in 2008, the domestic market of otaku-related contents, including DVD/CD, publications, games, goods and doujinshi, accounted for ¥186.68 billion (approximately US$1.8 billion) in 2007 (Media Create 2007, 18). There are about ¥100 billion difference between the two reports in 2004 and 2007, which might be caused by different definitions of survey population, 9 as well as different periods and 



8





Light novels refer to those novels primarily targeting at teenage readers. This kind of leisure literature can be read very fast, and sometimes include manga-style illustrations. The writing style of light novels is more causal than fiction and literature. 9 In addition to anime, manga and game otaku, the report by NRI included idols and PC assembly ones that could result in a wider range of consumers.

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methods of survey. However, both reports demonstrate that anime industry, or otaku market, is indeed a major industry in Japan.

Digital Technologies Although people in some Asian countries and in the United States had exposed to anime and manga since the 1960s and 1970s, anime fandom activities did not start thriving until the 1990s resulted from the development of digital technologies. Steve, an editor from Taiwan, described how the technological development influenced the anime industry: Now, the Internet is so fast that the pirated videos can be released almost the next day after broadcasting in Japan. Well, we could not get it so fast ten or twenty years ago, but there were pirated manga everywhere. Manga magazines were very cheap (about NT$1), and sometimes publishers would publish the same manga series in different magazines because no licenses were needed. For example, Dragon Ball Z was very popular then. One publisher would publish it on Monday weekly, while the other released it on Wednesday monthly. You could probably find Dragon Ball Z in all pirated manga magazines (Steve, Taiwan, May 6, 2008).

In Taiwan, people used to find the latest pirated manga magazines and anime videos from rental stores during the 1980s and 1990s. “When we were in high school, there was at least one manga rental store near every school in the Taipei County”, said Steve. Renting manga books, buying manga weeklies, and watching TV anime are common childhood experiences for the 30-something generation of Taiwanese. Yet, there were not many fandom activities to attend at that time. It was not until the late 1990s when the Internet became popular, anime fans were easier to find online fandom communities, share their affections and organize events together. In addition, younger generation fans have different experiences in choosing different media. For example, the 21-year-old boy, Bai, did not go to manga rental stores, but was more interested in video games: I played video games mostly before high school. I did not read manga until I discovered Fruit Basket and I own the whole collection of its manga and anime. I joined the Anime and Manga Club in high school and started reading manga and watched anime more assiduously (Bai, Taiwan, May 8, 2008).

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In the 1990s, pirated manga publishers ceased to publish unauthorised manga and started to buy the licenses from Japanese publishers. Manga rental stores still existed, but were not popular anymore. At the same time, digital and multi-media technologies rapidly developed, thus, anime fans in Taiwan were able to receive latest information from Japan simultaneously. In addition, geographic and cultural proximity has helped Taiwanese fans maintain a close relationship with Japanese anime industry. In fact, many Taiwanese fans claim that they visit Japan very often and are fluent in Japanese. The situations in the United States are different. Besides few senior otaku have watched anime early since the 1970s, American young people are just beginning to embrace Japanese popular culture passionately over the past ten years. “When I was 4 or 5 years old, I watched Gigantor, Kimba, and Speed Racer on TV. I did not know they were anime until I was about 15 or 16 years old”, said Al, a 47-year-old fans from the older generation of American otaku in New York City (New York, May 14, 2009). During the 1960s and 1970s, American television began to broadcast several anime, such as AstroBoy, Gigantor, and Speed Racer. However, most people did not realise that these cartoons were imported from Japan. In the 1980s and 1990s, many Japanese animation films, including Akira, Ghost in the Shell, and Princess Mononoke, started to receive more attention internationally. Many television anime were distributed through pirated video tapes by fans. In particular, Pokemon was the biggest Japanese cultural export in the 1990s. In recent years, manga becomes the fastest-growing category in American publishing business and its sales in the United States have tripled from 2003 to 2007 (Pink 2007). Unlike Taiwanese fans, American fans have encountered more difficulties in reading anime and manga due to cultural and language barriers. Most American fans do not acquire knowledge of Japanese language and need to rely on English subtitles. Many of them prefer to watch anime which has been dubbed in English. In the past, resources on anime were limited for American fans. They had to ask vendors from science fiction conventions whether they had pirated anime videos with English subtitles. For instance, Brian, another older generation fan and anime critic, went to a Star Trek convention in New York City in 1992 and found a vendor selling Japanese anime VHS videos. Brian was able to keep in touch with this vendor and discovered more pirated anime videos. However, not many fans did not have access to such resources. Most Americans actually learned about anime through TV channels, like Cartoon Network, much later. Moreover, accorded with the development of digital technologies, American fandom activities started to thrive since the early 2000s.

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Now, broadband Internet allows overseas anime fans to follow anime news from Japan and even stream or download videos online as soon as those programmes are broadcasted in Japan. The easy access to anime fandom groups and resources helps the expansion of anime fandom communities all over the world. These transnational otaku spend hours surfing Internet, watching videos, and networking with others. With digital technologies, they could remix the contents and recreate their own fan-made art works, which are also circulating in the market as part of the anime industry.

Affections instead of Resistance Academic research on media fans has been closely linked to the traditions of cultural studies, focusing on how the subculture resists against the mainstream hegemonic culture (Radway 1984; Jenkins 1992). However, otaku culture actually creates a different relationship with the anime industry that cannot be fully explained as a resistance against the mainstream hegemonic culture. The passionate anime fans recreate something new and form a particular subculture out of their affections, instead of resistance. Even though otaku may be able to remix and recreate cultural products with their own interpretations, they do not really think about “resistance”. On the contrary, they drift along the stream, spending money on anime-related products and easily becoming addicted to cultural objects. Otaku are usually the most loyal consumers of the “official” anime products. For example, Every time I got paid, I went to buy anime products, like five manga at a time, three DVDs, or a box set. Every paycheck, every two weeks … I have a huge collection at home. I buy bookshelves and have three bookshelves that are full now. I keep some manga in the closet and boxes, while some take up one-third of my bed. So I sleep with them (Frank, New York, May 24, 2009).

It suggests that otaku spend their money (sometimes their parents’) on anime-related products whenever possible, and build a huge collection at home. Some of them would buy mini-figures to decorate their rooms. Regarding those who make doujinshi or fan-made videos, their creativity is not coming out of “resistance” at all, but out of their love of anime. Furthermore, in the age of Web 2.0, the distinctions between consumers and producers are blurring. On the one hand, transnational otaku are not passive consumers anymore. Otaku takes advantages of digital technologies

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to remix and reproduce cultural products from the anime industry, so they could become creators and producers of anime products easily. On the other hand, anime companies make use of Internet to promote their products, welcoming users to appropriate their products under some conditions. Thus, it is not easy to tell whether the power structure is controlled by entrepreneurs or capitalists because consumers are able to negotiate and customise products in the age of Web 2.0 (Manovich 2009). Therefore, it is necessary to go beyond the traditional cultural studies without limiting the focus on the distinctions between producers and consumers, as well as the political resistance.

Database Consumption The Japanese cultural critic Azuma Hiroki ࣟ௯ધ points out that there is a transformation of the consumption pattern of otaku in the age of informational technology: from narrative consumption to database consumption㻃(Azuma 2001; 2009). First, the idea of narrative consumption was brought up by the Japanese writer and critic Otsuka Eiji ՕჂ૎‫ ݳ‬in 1989. Otsuka claims that Japanese otaku are searching for a “grand narrative”, a kind of “world-view”, or “cosmos” by consuming anime, manga and video game products. He sees the mode of consumption in the anime market, including amateur production, as a circulation of narrative consumption where consumers appropriate the products for seeking a grand narrative, and subsequently, they are able to produce their own narratives (Otsuka 1989, 17-8). More than ten years later, Azuma points out that grand narrative theory no longer had a significant influence on otaku consumers. It is a “database” of certain affective elements that otaku consume today. Azuma describes this phenomenon as database consumption to differentiate from the narrative consumption in the previous era. He claims that otaku is postmodern and otaku culture has the characteristics of postmodernity: disappearance of grand narrative (Lyotard) and production as simulacrum (Baudrillard and Deleuze). In his book Otaku: Japan’s Database Animals (2001; 2009), Azuma looks at otaku activity in terms of the “animalistic” behavioural response—a kind of affective responses toward certain character traits in the products of anime, manga and games. Such an affective response is called moe. The Japanese word moe န園, literally “bursting into bud,” has been used as an otaku slang word referring to special affection toward characters in anime, manga and video games. There are a lot of different descriptions

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and explanations of moe. The following one is quoted from a Japanese contemporary artist Murakami Takashi’s ‫ޘ‬Ղၼ (b. 1963) gallery book Little Boy: The Arts of Japan’s Exploding Subculture (2005): The term moe originated in a computerized transcription error, when the character meaning “to burst into bud” (moeru န園坕) was substituted for the homonym meaning “to catch fire” (moeru ᗏ園坕). Moe in otaku jargon denotes a rarefied pseudo-love for certain fictional characters (in anime, manga, and the like) and their related embodiments” (Murakami 2005, 182).

For example, when a male otaku sees his favourite female character on screen, it is probably the maid outfit with green hair or cat ears that cause the otaku to have a kind of indescribable feeling stirring up inside him. It is something related to sexual drive that stimulates someone to feel erotic. However, the sexual arousal of moe does not equal to sex. It is actually more about the “virtual” sexual fantasy (Ibid., 172). These female characters usually possess some kind of traits which have been systemised as “moe-elements” (Azuma 2009, 42): elements such as colours of hair, animal ears or tails, maid outfits, school uniforms or swimming suits, as well as many kinds of personalities, occupations and social positions. In dating simulation bishoujo games particularly, many female characters are designed with moe-elements extracted from the database. A player could pick his favourite character according to his individual preference, and falls in love with this character in the game. Most otaku whom I interviewed in Taiwan could easily point out several moe-elements when I asked them their favourite characters and definitions of moe: My definition of moe? Well, something I like, makes me feel happy and devoted to ... My moe characters should be bishoujo wearing school uniform. Hmm … cat-ears or tail is also great (Bai, male, Taiwan, May 8, 2008). I like one particular occupation in the game RO 10 : female crusader. It is similar to knight. I like knight as an occupation and I like the cloak that he/she is wearing. It is a kind of fetishism, I guess. For me, “cloak” is my moe-element (Angel, male, Taiwan, May 15, 2008). 



10 Ragnarok Online is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) created by Gravity Co., Ltd., South Korea in 2001.

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There are several moe-elements mentioned in the above examples: school uniform, cat-ears, tail, knight and cloak. Taiwanese otaku have categorised and systematised moe-elements and can easily pick them up from the database. The feelings of moe are subjective, depending on individual preferences. Moreover, even if otaku are able to list their favourite moe-elements, it is not always true that any character which fits these elements will stimulate their moe responses. The response to moe is unpredictable and indeterminate. According to Azuma, such a moe response is more like an instinctive response of animal (Azuma 2009, 86-8). Different from animals, human beings have desire to build social relations with the other. Unlike human desires, animal needs can be satisfied without the other. Azuma argues that otaku are becoming animals because their needs could now be satisfied immediately and mechanically by the right formula of moe-elements. Otaku—the “database animals”, different from human beings who consciously search for something meaningful to satisfy their desire—are now satisfied more directly and mechanically. Without consciousness, they become accustomed to being sexually stimulated by looking at illustrations of those girls with moe-elements. Otaku had been exposed to innumerable moe sexual expressions, and then at some point, they are trained to feel moe in a very direct and animalist way. Such feelings are not conscious desires but more about bodily affective feelings. In Taiwan, otaku’s responses are similar to Azuma’s database animals. Almost every Taiwanese otaku knows the concept of moe. They could point out which characters are moe, or what moe-elements they like. Female otaku usually link “moe” to BL (Boy’s Love), which is a doujinshi genre of two males having a romantic sexual relationship. 11 Some otaku mention that moe is related to kawaii (cuteness) or sexiness. On the other hand, more than half of American fans I have interviewed do not know what “moe” is. Three of them have heard the word from a Japanese maid concert in Manhattan in New York City and assume it meant “bravo”, or perceive it as a term to “encourage people to do something, or give applause”. Some regard moe as “cute”. Only few American otaku understand the meaning of moe as “some feelings bursting from inside” and they are those extreme otaku who could speak Japanese fluently or collect anime or manga products more than anyone else. For example, KD has 



11 Female otaku’s concept of moe is very different from male’s. It is usually linked to BL, or yaoi, homosexual-content doujinshi. This is another issue required further discussion. Even so, the feelings or affective responses of moe such as “bursting” or “burning” are the same. However, in this paper, I will simply focus on the male otaku.

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learned Japanese for at least two years and visited Japan a few years ago. He knows a lot about moe, but does not appreciate it very much: I study a lot and know that some of these [moe characters] are about marketing, you know. Because they are trying to market … Basically, they are targeting at guys who like these women. They do not have decent content but just to make money. They are taking advantage from people … I do not like it [moe]. It is cute. It is like small doses … but I do not want to be assaulted with this, should not focus on it (KD, male, New York, May 17, 2009).

It is interesting that anime fans who are older or who take it more serious tend to reject the idea of moe. Such responses are more significant with American fans. They usually focus more on the storylines and contents. When being asked about their favourite anime characters, whether or not they know the idea of moe, most American fans choose characters with stronger personalities, instead of ones who are cute or sexy. I like characters which are more developed, have deeper side in them. Major from Ghost in the Shell or Lucky from Elfen Lied … because they are very complicated, very complex … (Mike, New York, May 12, 2009).

Brian, aged around 50, makes it very clear that his favourite characters of anime should be “real” in our real life, even though they are fictional: I like Shizuku from Whisper of the Heart because she is a very strong, vibrant recreated individual. She is very self-confident and knows very well what she wants to do. She focuses on it and has an active social life. My other favourite fantasy characters are Faye from Cowboy Bebop, Fuu from Samurai Champloo, and Misato from EVA. I like them because they were self-confident, strong, skilled and funny. But they are also vulnerable … They have the moments of emotional … kind of the darkness, feel very bad and sad. Things do not always go well with them (Brian, New York, June 25, 2009).

Most of the American anime fans I interviewed told similar stories. Their favourite characters are usually strong, intelligent, confident, skillful and humorous. Sometimes, these characters are allowed to show their weaknesses or dark sides because it looks more human. Those fans who do not know about moe usually do not express their affective feelings toward a character, but calmly analyse the character’s story. This pattern aligns more closely to the narrative consumption theory: they read carefully and analyse the narratives, searching for meanings or a kind of “cosmo”, a worldview.

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American fans do not always consume anime or manga in a narrative pattern. Some, especially younger generation, would still read anime characters in an affective and animalistic way—toward database consumption. For instance, Frank and Chris would talk about moe in detailed and enjoy moe characters very much. When they talked about their favourite characters, they vividly described moe characters with more emotional terms. American fans who know better about moe tend to be more “animal-like”, for they have more instinctive responses to cute or sexy girls. This reaction is expected in Azuma’s description of database consumption. Thanks to some anime DVDs in the American market, 12 and news reports and programmes on the mainstream channels, 13 the American media began to introduce the idea of moe to local audiences. American audiences could learn more about moe. In the recent New York Anime Festival in September 2009, I also found that there were more and more American fans, especially young otaku, being able to talk about their feelings of moe. 







Affective Otaku Japanese anime industry has been deeply influenced by moe-oriented products since the early 2000s. It is no longer the narratives but the moe characters that anime fans pursue through reading manga, watching anime, or playing video games. This transformation is highly related to the Internet and other digital technologies. Azuma’s database consumption is based on the concept of moe, and I argue that moe is also linked to a kind of automatic bodily response—affect. Affect refers to pre-individual capacities, a kind of potential bodily response prior to consciousness, which can be stimulated or modulated by technologies (Massumi 2002; Clough 2008). Affect is not the same as emotion, but it may influence, modulate, or trigger emotions. Taking the digital device iPod as an example, playing it with certain music repetitively and intensively may affect listeners’ heartbeats or breathes (affect), which may further result in making them happy or sad (emotion). Holding to the 12 Some anime fans mentioned that they learned about moe from anime DVDs released in the United States such as The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya and Lucky Star. 13 Apart from moe-related news reports on CNN and FOX, ABC sitcom 30 Rock, the episode with James Franco as a special guest, has introduced the phenomenon of “pillow lover”, originated from Japanese moe culture. See Anime News Network 2010.

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differentiation between affect and emotion, I regard moe as the becomingconscious expression of affect, not quite conscious emotion. Affect involves the interactions among viewers, simulacra (products/ images which are neither original nor copy), characters and databases. In particular, the Internet plays a significant role in linking the activities of reading and writing together and blurs the boundary of consumptionproduction relationships. It is the digitalisation, including databases, search engines and blogs of the Internet making the shift to database consumption possible. Under such circumstances, through excessive repetitive viewing, consumption and production, passionate otaku are stimulated and modulated by affects and emotions. Additionally, moe motivates and stimulates otaku to do something voluntarily and creates certain kinds of values. Tiziana Terranova’s term “free labour” is a form of labour which is not produced directly in the interest of capital, but still creates monetary values out of knowledge, culture, or affect. As Terranova suggests, in the digital economy, the relations between the bodily affects, technology and production become more complex (Terranova 2004, 79-80). Free labour is a kind of cultural and technical labour (such as building websites, participating virtual communities, or downloading and uploading videos) that continuously produces values in the flows of network culture—all correspond with the activities otaku passionately involved. Otaku spend a lot of time on surfing the Internet, chatting what they love, sharing information, and contributing their knowledge of anime with other fans online—with the advent of the Internet. Thus, such free labour is also affective and involves labour of immaterial knowledge, communication and cooperation. The otaku, the passionate obsessive, the information age’s embodiment of the connoisseur, more concerned with the accumulation of data than of objects … Understanding otaku-hood, I think, is one of the keys to understanding the culture of the web. There is something profoundly post-national about it, extra-geographic (Gibson 2001).

As the science fiction writer William Gibson puts it, otaku culture is post-national and extra-geographic. In other words, it represents the culture of the Internet. Transnational otaku take the advantage of the Internet and become actively involved in fandom activities. They are always the forerunners of digital technologies. Willing to provide their computer profession freely, some fans write software programs and design websites for the benefits of other fans. Others write articles, critiques and introductory manuals on online forums, sharing their ideas and knowledge with each other. Otaku who make doujinshi usually promote their works on

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personal websites, while cosplayers share their experiences of making costumes and buying materials online. The Internet allows the otaku culture to grow rapidly and globally, and mostly through otaku’s voluntarily affective or free labour. Among the fans I interviewed in Taiwan, most of them are doujinshi artists or cosplayers. They began as passionate anime consumers and then voluntarily spent time and energy to make something out of their favourite works. About one-fourth of the time I am awake, I am surfing online—all about anime and manga, of course. Sometimes I write articles for my blog to express some opinions, or drawing pictures. Sometimes I visit anime and manga websites such as PTT 14 … and sometimes when I am looking for inspiration or data for my painting, I would visit YouTube and NicoNico. 15 They are very useful (Sue, female, Taiwan, May 7, 2008). 







In Taiwan, there are many doujinshi-related conventions. Small ones are usually organised by manga clubs in colleges, while large ones are held by two major companies: Comic World Taiwan (CWT) and Fancy Frontier (FF). Doujinshi artists and fans gather at conventions to trade and exchange art works. Cosplayers also attend the same events and display their costumes outside or around the conventions venues. It is important for doujinshi artists to attend these conventions in order to sell their artworks. However, the sales usually cannot cover the costs. Sue, the owner of doujinshi café, is lucky enough to earn her living by running a café, making doujinshi, and giving lectures. In the beginning, she did not think about making money but started writing and painting because she just loved to do so. Later, she produces illustrations for publishers, teaches manga and doujinshi drawing in high school manga clubs, and does small business such as making crafts and toys. Eventually, Sue becomes a professional doujinshi artist with adequate income to support her living. For Tifa, another successful doujinshi artist, she regards making doujinshi as a hobby, but not a job. She understands that it is difficult to survive simply by being a doujinshi artist. Even though her moe-oriented doujinshi are actually very popular among male otaku, she claims that she still cannot earn enough money to cover the costs so far. “It is all out of our ‘LOVE’ for the anime. We do all these works voluntarily because we have love for the characters”, Tifa said (Tifa, May 22, 2008). 14

PTT is the most popular Bulletin Board System (BBS) in Taiwan. Nico Nico Douga (垌坴垌坴೯㪃, www.nicovideo.jp) is a popular video sharing website in Japan.

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In fact, doujinshi are not common in the United States. Some anime fans do not know what they are, and many regard doujinshi as erotic pornography. There are very few fans selling self-published doujinshi in anime conventions and no doujinshi-themed conventions are held in the United States. Most of the amateur artists I interviewed simply considered looking for publishers who could publish their artworks. The only self-published works they could think of is online fan-fiction. They seldom think about publishing doujinshi by themselves. According to Barlee, one of the few American doujinshi artists, there are three reasons why doujinshi are not common in the United States: 1) the requiring amount of effort; 2) copyright issue; and 3) printing costs (Barlee, April 20, 2010). Without doujinshi of certain character images circulating among fans, most American fans could only access to manga and anime by commercial products. Indeed, characters with moe-elements are included in these commercial products. However, without the channel of doujinshi production delivering the concept of moe, the amount of the flows of affect could be relatively small. Lack of understanding of moe and limited access to moe products may explain why American fans’ consumption and reproduction patterns are more toward narrative consumption than database consumption.

Conclusion Based on my ethnographic observations and face-to-face interviews with anime fans, more American otaku follow a pattern of narrative consumption, while their Taiwanese counterparts tend to be more like database animalised otaku. American otaku have limited understanding of moe, while Taiwanese otaku have more comprehensive ideas about moe and mostly embrace this concept. For those who understand and accept the concept of moe, their consumption and reproduction patterns are more closely resembled to database animals: they have more responses and reactions toward moe characters, and more enjoy making doujinshi or fan-made art works. It links to Azuma’s argument: once otaku are exposed to many moe characters sexually stimulated images, at some point they become trained to react and will be stimulated by looking at cute girls, cat ears, maid outfits, or other moe-elements (Azuma 2009, 89). My interviews were conducted between 2008 and 2009. Nevertheless, according to more recent observations, the concept of moe seems getting more and more popular among younger American fans. American otaku might encounter some cultural and language barriers in the early stage of understanding the meaning of moe. With the development of digital

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technologies, the amount and transmission speed of moe images and the flows of affect will become more enormous and synchronous. I expect that American fans will learn more about moe, change their preferences toward moe-elements, and eventually turn themselves into database animals.

Works Cited Interviews Steve, male, 32, Taipei, Taiwan, May 6, 2008. Sue, female, Taipei, Taiwan, May 7, 2008. Bai, male, 21, Taipei, Taiwan, May 8, 2008. Angel, male, 29, Taipei, Taiwan, May 15, 2008. Tifa, female, Tainan, Taiwan, May 22, 2008. Mike, male, 29, New York City, United States, May 12, 2009. Al, male, New York City, United States, May 14, 2009. KD, male, 22, New York City, United States, May 17, 2009. Frank, male, 27, New York City, United States, May 24, 2009. Brian, male, New York City, United States, June 25, 2009. Barlee, female, California, United States, email correspondence, April 20, 2010.

Printed Sources Azuma, Hiroki. 2001. Doubutsukasuru posuto modan: Otaku kara mita Nihon shakai ೯ढ֏圣坕垞坺垉垣垁垴ʊ坫垀坰圕坓ߠ圩ֲ‫ء‬ष. Tokyo: Kodansha. —. 2009. Otaku: Japan’s Database Animals. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. (English translation of 2001 Doubutsukasuru posuto modan ೯ढ֏圣坕垞坺垉垣垁垴ѧ坫垀坰圕坓ߠ圩ֲ‫ء‬ष㢸) Clough, Patricia T. 2008. The Affective Turn: Political Economy, Biomedia and Bodies. Theory, Culture and Society 25, 1: 1-22. Gibson, William. 2001. Modern Boys and Mobile Girls. The Observer, April 1. Observer Magazine section. Jenkins, Henry. 1992. Textual Poachers: Television Fans and Participatory Culture. New York: Routledge. Katayama, Lisa. 2009. Love in 2-D. The New York Times Magazine, July 26. Manovich, Lev. 2009. The Practice of Everyday (Media) Life: From Mass Consumption to Mass Cultural Production? Critical Inquiry 35, 2:

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319-31. Massumi, Brian. 2002. Parables for the Virtual: Movement, Affect, Sensation. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Media Create. 2007. 2008 Otaku sangyo hakusho ˅˃˃ˋ坫垀坰㶷ᄐ‫ػ‬஼. Tokyo: Media Create. Murakami, Takashi, ed. 2005. Little Boy: The Arts of Japan’s Exploding Subculture. Bilingual. New York: Japan Society; New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Otsuka, Eiji. 1989. Monogatari shohiron: “Bikkuriman” no shinwagaku ढ ፿௣၄ᓵʳˍψ垔垄坰垫垟垴ω圸ళᇩ䝤. Tokyo: Shin-yo-sha. Pink, Daniel H. 2007. Japan, Ink: Inside the Manga Industrial Complex. Wired, 15, 11: 216-23, October 22. Radway, Janice A. 1984. Reading the Romance: Women, Patriarchy, and Popular Literature. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. Roquet, Paul. 2009. Ambient Literature and the Aesthetics of Calm: Mood Regulation in Contemporary Japanese Fiction. The Journal of Japanese Studies 35, 1: 87-111. Shiraishi, Saya S. 1997. Japan’s Soft Power: Doraemon Goes Overseas. In Network Power: Japan and Asia, edited by Peter J. Katzenstein, 234-72. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. Terranova, Tiziana. 2004. Network Culture: Politics for the Information Age. London; Ann Arbor, MI: Pluto Press.

Internet Sources Anime News Network. 2010. News: Anime Culture Mentioned on 4 U.S. TV Shows This Week (Updated), January 17. http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2010-01-17/anime-culturementioned-on-3-u.s-tv-shows-this-week (accessed April 3, 2010). Kitabayashi, Ken. 2004. The Otaku Group from a Business Perspective: Revaluation of Enthusiastic Consumers. Nomura Research Institute: NRI Papers, December 1. http://www.nri.co.jp/english/opinion/papers/2004/np200484.html. Metro Anime Website. http://metroanime.org/ (accessed April 2, 2010).



CHAPTER THIRTEEN MARKETING THE OTHER: EXOTICISM IN THE PROMOTION OF LITERATURE FROM THE MIDDLE EAST AND ASIA DUYGU TEKGÜL

Book covers are among the myriad of images we encounter almost every day. When literary texts, especially novels, are translated from other languages, their covers are usually invested with a function of representing the source culture. Therefore, the narratives on these media become the sites for covert discourses. This essay gives an outline of marketing and promotion practices in the British book industry today and discusses exoticising strategies adopted by publishers, focusing on covers, 1 just one of many other paratextual elements in books. The phenomena will be illustrated with case studies of selected book covers and other examples from the book trade. These will be analysed to show that the employment of exoticism, when highlighted in book promotion, seems to indicate Orientalist representations. Rather than presenting a statistical survey, this study aims at discussing the implications of an identified discourse, concluding with the hypothesis that this Orientalist discourse might feed into a tendency of reading translated fiction for its exoticness, rather than its literariness. 



Book Publishing in Britain For a critical analysis of any phenomenon in the British book market today, it is essential to understand the dynamics of the industry. As a commercial activity, publishing in Britain today is very much profit-driven 1 Throughout the article, the term “cover” will be used to refer to the outer visual element of a book, including dust jackets.

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and dominated by large corporations (Abercrombie 1990, 176). While publishing was seen as a family business before World War II, small publishers were gradually taken over by larger firms to form conglomerates in the second half of the twentieth century. By the 1970s, the top five publishing corporations claimed 70% of paperback sales (Murdock and Golding 1979, 25). Concentration has meant that fewer central powers own the means of production and determine the main trends in publishing. Today, these oligopolies attract much criticism for the selection of books that are available on the market. Book retailers have also formed oligopolies. Especially in the 1990s, through mergers and acquisitions, chain bookshops increasingly dominated the market (Clark 2001, 69). Some of these chains operate a centralised buying system, whereby specialised central buyers based at the headquarters decide on what all the branches should stock and in what quantities (Ibid., 72). This situation has heightened publishers’ concerns over sales, and as a result, they try to pre-sell their books to central buyers before they decide on their print runs (Ibid., 123). In some cases, entire book projects are cancelled if the demand forecasted by central buyers is low. This system has been blamed for the lack of diversity in the book market. Along with concentration, the profit-orientation tendency has intensified in the last decades of the twentieth century. The book market followed the 1980s shift of power from producer to consumer in other industries. This meant that “the capacity to determine the form, nature and quality of goods and services moved from the former to the latter” (Abercrombie 1990, 172). In line with the general transition from Fordism to post-Fordism, mass-marketing methods in the publishing industry were replaced by more market-oriented approaches (Ibid., 183). As a result, books are marketed today in a way that is not very different from the marketing of Fast Moving Consumer Goods categories; in other words, commercial considerations are placed at the centre of most projects (Ibid., 175). In general, book publishers employ a three-step marketing strategy for their titles: segmentation, targeting and positioning. Segmentation refers to the breaking down of the general consumer market into segments, according to readers’ age, gender, location, socio-economic class, reading habits, etc. For each specific title, publishing houses identify a certain segment and devise marketing strategies geared towards a specific audience. This targeting decision informs the marketing mix for specific titles: they try to find the right combination of product, price, place (distribution) and promotion. The next step is positioning, which refers to placing the product in the potential buyer’s mind (Phillips 2007, 22-3). This

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process is precisely what Frankfurt School thinkers censure in the culture industry. Cultural critics Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer believe that this categorisation assigns a passive role to the consumer, and leads people into conformity by inhibiting critical thinking and selectivity. They postulate that, in modern societies “everybody must behave […] in accordance with his previously determined and indexed level, and choose the category of mass product turned out for his type” (Adorno and Horkheimer 1979, 123). Furthermore, they argue that the culture industry schematises life, i.e., it patterns or pre-forms experience. Everything passes through the filters of the central holders of power and all information that reaches people is pre-digested (Ibid., 124). Further to this background information about the book industry in Britain, let us now look at the process of producing translated novels. It is estimated that only 3% of the over 120,000 books published annually in the United Kingdom are translations, which includes all genres and text types (Clee 2005, 27). If we look at translations from the languages of the Middle East, as well as East and South Asia, the selection criteria for books have been in tune with commercial considerations of British publishing houses. In other words, publishers embark on translation projects based on what is fashionable, appealing, or in demand (Starkey 2000, 154). It is also suggested that they look for certain local or regional themes in the novels that they would like to have translated (Paker 2000, 623). In addition, they seem to opt for foreignising translation strategies (See Salama-Carr 2000, 158; Wu 2000, 235; Gessel 2000, 241 and Trivedi 2000, 461). Foreignising as a textual strategy involves retaining linguistic and cultural elements from the source culture, with a view to producing a more colourful text (Venuti 1998, 240).

Book Covers Literary critic Gérard Genette has coined a term for the elements that transform texts into books: paratexts. These are verbal or other productions that adorn, reinforce, accompany and present the main text in a book and they usually mark the zone between text and off-text. According to Genette, paratexts are sites for aesthetic and ideological investments (Genette 1997, 12). Front covers, perhaps more than the other features, are known to shape readers’ expectations. During the last several decades, covers have played a special role in the wider strategies for marketing books (Matthews 2007, xiii) and they have been described as a key selling device similar to advertising in their format and purpose (Powers 2001, 6). Catchy covers encourage consumers to pick

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up books, study the front and back covers and maybe read the blurb. The potential buyer is then five times more likely to purchase the product (Clymer 2005, cit. in Phillips 2007, 29). Research carried out in 1982 indicated that about half of the sales in bookshops are on-the-spot impulse purchases. Out of these, in 30% of the cases, consumers buy the book because they like the look of it; and in 40% of the cases, they have no prior knowledge of the book or the author (The Impulse Buying of Books survey, cit. in Clark 2001, 68). It is understood that book covers play a vital role in convincing consumers that the book they are browsing is worth buying. Front covers usually feature a carefully designed combination of imagery and text. They might be seen as a tease, “partially revealing, partially concealing the content” (Weedon 2007, 117). Generally, the wider the target segment of a particular book, the more likely it is that the cover and blurb will feature clichés, which serve as simple signifiers to a wide audience (Phillips 2007, 22). In the publishing business, the cover design is usually a matter of negotiation, where a power relationship between the interested parties is involved. The author might have a preference for a specific design, but they would have to convince the publisher who normally has concerns over market visibility. In cases where the author is a début novelist, or is no longer alive, or is a foreign author, the decision is usually at the publisher’s discretion. While it is likely that members of the editorial departments at British publishers are fluent in at least one other European language, it is impossible for publishers to have many non-European languages spoken among their staff. As a result of the market pressure, the covers have to be ready much earlier than the text. For example, they have to be sent to retailers and appear on online sellers for pre-orders. Consequently, in the first editions of translated novels, unless the designer or the editor speaks the source language, they have to design the cover without reading the text. In such cases, the cover is the product of the publisher’s imagination, and partly the projection of their conception of the novel’s setting. Genette argues that even the author’s name in a book can serve as a paratext, shaping readers’ expectations (Genette 1997, 40). A marketing professional from a British publishing conglomerate admits that when publishers are deciding on packaging strategies for translated books, they sometimes try to hide the fact that it has been translated from another language, because it poses an impediment for people to decide to read these books (Bratchell 2009). Hiding the fact that a book has been translated can be achieved by writing the author’s name in small print on the front cover. However, writers from China, Japan, Korea, Central Asian countries, India,

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Bangladesh and Arabic-speaking countries usually have names which sound inescapably “foreign” to Western readers. In that case, the perceived “foreignness” of a book is a factor that publishers should carefully consider in their attempts to make a certain book as appealing as possible to potential consumers. Sometimes, the answer is to actually emphasise the foreignness in marketing the book. Once a cover design has been agreed on, it has to pass the central buyer’s test before going into print. At this stage, central buyers may suggest changes to the cover in order to make it easier to position the book within the particular subgenre. One independent publisher explains that they might prefer specific cover designs that resemble a similar product which was a sales success (Kilgarriff 2009). This dimension adds to the complexity of narratives invested in the cover.

Case Studies Let us consider some examples for translated book covers. Random House’s Vintage imprint features a series called “Vintage East” (2006) (Fig. 13-1) consisting of books mostly translated from East Asian languages. 2 The book covers in this selection mostly feature iconic imagery reminiscent of East Asian cultures. For example, there is a recurring red circle in all the nine covers; a geisha, a rising sun, waves, a pagoda, part of the Great Wall, a calligraphic rendering of the Chinese character for the word “woman”, and a plait of straight, black hair adorn individual covers. On the publisher’s website, the series is promoted with phrases like “Take Your Imagination East” and “Full of Eastern Promise” (Random House Ltd. 2006). Other examples of translations from Asian languages include The Village of Stone (Vintage, 2005) by Guo Xiaolu, The Housekeeper and the Professor (Harvill Secker, 2009) by Ogawa Yoko and The Home and the World (Penguin, 2005) by Rabindranath Tagore. On the cover of Village, translated from Chinese, there is a face of an Asian girl, and some goldfish. The cover designed for the Housekeeper, from Japanese features decorative pattern symbolizing clouds, typical of traditional Japanese porcelain. On Tagore’s The Home, translated from Bengali, we see the henna applied hands of a woman, with bangles on each wrist. 

2



This series consists of Norwegian Wood by Murakami Haruki, Autobiography of a Geisha by Masuda Sayo, The Girl Who Played Go by Shan Sa, The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea by Mishima Yukio, Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress by Dai Sijie, Out by Kirino Natsuo, The Good Women of China by Xinran, Red Dust by Ma Jian, and Waiting by Ha Jin (written originally in English).

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If we move on to Middle Eastern literature, we can discuss The Cairo Trilogy (Black Swan, 1998) by the Egyptian author Naguib Mahfouz, and 2 Girls (Serpent’s Tail, 2005) written by Perihan Ma÷den and translated from Turkish. The Cairo Trilogy is composed of Palace Walk, The Palace of Desire (Fig. 13-2) and Sugar Street. The covers of the English translations have been designed in a similar fashion, with recurring visual elements, like dome silhouettes. The individual cover designs contain a fez, a woman in a hijab, sitting on a rug and playing a lute, and a low table with a jug on it. On the cover of 2 Girls, we see two young ladies sitting on the edge of a swimming pool in their underwear, accompanied by the photograph of a mosque in the upper half of the cover. According to semiology, everyday life is full of signs. This theory, which is based on Ferdinand de Saussure’s theory on language, aims at deconstructing signs based on their associations. A semiological sign is composed of a signifier—a word, an image, a sound, a gesture—and a signified—the mental representation that the signifier elicits. Signifiers exist in planes of expressions, and they correspond to signifieds that are found in planes of content (Barthes 1967, 39). The act, which binds the signifier and the signified, is known as signification (Ibid., 48). As we are presented with verbal, audio or visual stimuli in our daily lives, we produce meanings out of codes and signs that we recognise (Strinati 2004, 98). For example, when we see the picture of a house, this visual representation acts as a signifier, leading us to conjure the concept of house in our mind, which, in this case, is the signified. On the other hand, connotation is a complex structure which involves a sign, whose signified is another signifier in itself (Barthes 1967, 90). For instance, the picture of a Union Jack is a signifier for the concept of “British flag”; it elicits the representation of the British flag in our minds, which in turn signifies Britain. As a result, the Union Jack serves as a connotator for Britain for most people. Barthes argues that the signifieds of connotations are closely linked to culture, knowledge and history, and through these, to ideology (Ibid., 91-2). We come across connotations in various media in our daily lives, especially in advertising, which makes extensive use of this tool. One may observe here connotators that signify particular geographical locations, cultures, or religions. In the Vintage East book covers, red circles signify the Japanese flag, and the rising sun image used to be the ensign of the Imperial Japanese Army’s flag. The sea waves on another cover seem to be inspired by Hokusai Katsushika’s (1760- 1849) famous woodblock print The Great Wave Off Kanagawa (1832). In the other covers, goldfish connotes Chinese culture, porcelain patterns Japanese; henna and bangles Indian, and fez, lute and low table Middle Eastern, hijab and mosque are

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signifiers for the Muslim religion. 4 Moreover, it is possible to come across this emphasis on exoticism on other paratexts as well. For example, blurbs might be scattered with words that refer to sensuality, or the setting might be described like an exotic destination. Epitexts—in Genette’s term, paratexts which are outside the physical limits of the book (Genette 1997, 5)—for example business-to-business promotion correspondence, point-of-sale material in booksellers, advertisements in literary magazines, and literature reviews might draw attention to the same foreign element, which all together contribute to the books’ positioning within a certain cultural niche. This exoticising trend is paralleled in the packaging strategies for books that have been written by English speaking authors, depicting Middle Eastern, East or South Asian countries. While the most obvious cases might be guidebooks and travel writing, books from all fiction and non-fiction genres are showcased for their exotic details. This includes the works of world authors who choose to write in English to give their books more currency in the international readership. Booksellers sometimes choose to highlight exotic origins in displaying and promoting their products. For example, in April 2009, Oxford Blackwell’s bookshop featured a display arrangement where books from India were organised on a desk with a poster that reads “Asian Tigers” and “Tales of the East” on either side. The books on display were not all translations; some of them have been written by Indian authors in English, and are set in India. 

Self, Other and Orientalism Visual representations are sometimes sites of empowered discourses. The examples that we have examined bring to mind the concepts of “Othering” and Orientalism. The concept of “the Other” is usually associated with post-colonialist theory. Objectification is one of the crucial elements of “Othering”; 4

These objects may or may not play an essential role in the plot; in this respect, it might be an interesting exercise to contrast the translated book covers with the original ones. For example, the fish have a place in the plot of the Village of Stone, but the Chinese publisher has not used the fish image on the covers. Similarly, a woman playing the lute is a theme in the Palace of Desire, but it is not featured on the cover of the Arabic version. The Egyptian publisher of the Cairo Trilogy has used historical difference as a potentially attractive element, but their design would obviously not strike Egyptian readers as one highlighting cultural difference.

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post-colonialist critic Homi Bhabha discusses Otherness as “an articulation of difference contained within the fantasy of origin and identity” (Bhabha 2004, 96). According to Bhabha, the concept of Otherness brings with it the questions of the mode of representation of Otherness. He discusses fixity as another element of colonial discourse; he describes it as a “sign of cultural/historical/racial difference” which connotes “rigidity and an unchanging order” (Ibid., 94). The concept of “Otherness” is a central element of Orientalism. Orientalism, a theory put forward by Edward Said (1935-2003), roughly refers to Western constructions of the East. In Said’s analysis, it is the aggregate of Western statements, representations, descriptions and analyses on the Middle East and Asia starting from the late eighteenth century onwards. Said sees this as a tool for “dominating, restructuring, and having authority over the Orient” (Said 1979, 3). Orientalism has made use of literature, along with social sciences, in circulating its discourse (Ibid., 15). Ethnographic realism has been the concern of certain scholars and artists studying the Orient. For example, in the nineteenth century, European travellers to the East brought back their travelogues describing life in Istanbul and Cairo. These accounts, sometimes coloured by passages inspired by the Arabian Nights, were received with much enthusiasm and served to reinforce Western ideals of the exotic (Roberts 2007, 62-3). Orientalist subjects were also embraced in fiction, notably in the works of artists such as Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834), Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822), Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849), Victor Hugo (1802-1885), Gustave Flaubert (1821-1880), Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832), Gérard de Nerval (1808-1855) and F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940) (Ibid., 53). Along with the vogue for writing about the Orient, there was also a passion for representing it visually. Western painters depicted events and picturesque scenes from daily life in the Middle East and Asia. Fed by a mix of fact and fantasy, this visual expression of the movement employed themes like violence and eroticism widely (Lemaire 2005, 60). Orientalist art had its heyday in the nineteenth century, starting with Eugène Delacroix’s (1798-1863) Massacre at Chios (1824) (Rodinson 2002, 68). Other painters following this fashion depicted fierce and lavish scenes in a wild array of colors; harems and seraglios; decapitated bodies, women hurled into the Bosporus in sacks; feluccas and brigantines displaying the Crescent flag; round, turquoise domes and white minarets soaring to the heavens, viziers, eunuchs, and odalisques; refreshing

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Thus, from works of visual arts to verbal accounts, sensuality has been a source of the exoticness. Some critics point out that Orientalist visual representations have functioned as spectacles for the Western eye: The central role of the white spectator, the objective of spectacles as a confirmation of their position as global consumers of exotic cultures, … all remain fundamental to the spectacle of Otherness many continue to enjoy (Fusco 2002, 560).

The book covers discussed in the above case studies fit these descriptions in a number of ways. In all of the book covers, there is an emphasis on cultural difference, and also on racial difference on the cover of The Village. The focus on tangibility and sensuality leads these representations to be objectified. The lute and the jug on the covers of The Cairo Trilogy suggest music and drinks, while the cover of 2 Girls, and to a certain extent, the cover of The Home show female skin. On the cover of Palace of Desire, the figure is sitting at one end of the rug, facing the length of it. This composition suggests that the rug has been intended as a prayer mat. However, the whole illustration indicates a conflation of objects from the private and public spheres: music is usually played as a public performance, but the existence of the prayer mat rules out this possibility. The hijab proves problematic in the portrayal of a public performance; furthermore, if this woman is playing the lute in her private home, she does not really need to be wearing a hijab. Moreover, a prayer mat is a household item that is used exclusively for praying purposes. If we move on to 2 Girls, it would not be far-fetched to compare its modern cover to nineteenth century Orientalist paintings, showing Ottoman women in the imperial harem or in a Turkish bath, half-naked and posed intimately. 6 The fact that we only see the hands of the woman on the cover of The Home, makes us curious about what her face and the rest of her body look like, thus mobilising our imagination. Moreover, it might be observed that the imagery on the covers of The Professor, The Home, and the three books that make The Cairo Trilogy, has been detached from any temporal indicators, and thus rendered ahistorial which is a sign of fixation. Finally, almost all of these book covers have been intended to show glimpses of 

5



From the Turkish word gâvur, a derogatory word used to refer to non-Muslims. This particular book cover bears a striking resemblance to Bathing Scene (1881) by Jean-Léone Gérôme (1824-1904), for example.

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spectacles. Their focus on racial difference, their fixation of Eastern peoples in ahistorical contexts, and their objectification of elements pertaining to Eastern lifestyles through iconic imagery suggest that these book covers are part of an Orientalised representation. It could be argued that these works of graphic design are the modern-day extensions of the Orientalist tradition in visual arts. Edward Said makes a distinction between latent and manifest Orientalism. The former is described as an almost unconscious positivity, perhaps a well-meaning but one-dimensional representation of the Eastern countries, cultures and peoples. Manifest Orientalism, on the other hand, involves an overtly hegemonic and misguiding view of the East, including the various statements about Eastern societies, languages, literatures, history, etc. (Said 1979, 206). The type of Orientalism which is observable in the marketing practices of British publishers is most probably of the former. It is impossible to conceive of the world as divided between the East and West, and Orientalism today does not involve a binaristic East-West divide. The Orient originally referred to a geographical designation; today, however, it is seen as an imaginary place which is variously located in any space from the Jewish East End of London to the European colonies in North Africa, the Middle East and Asia. In short, the Orient is not so much a physical space as the idea of everything exotic and other (Mirzoeff 2002, 475). Even everyday objects and experiences can give the feeling of exoticism, which is described as “the thrill of ‘escape,’ that sense of being transported through art or lifestyle without ever leaving one’s own culture” (Rodinson 2002, 38). The application of this theory to the practices of the publishing industry also proves that “East” and “West” are merely mental constructs. For example, Turkey, as a country, which is believed to have liminal geographical location and cultural identity, is curiously both a producer of Orientalist representations, and is itself portrayed in that manner. Publishers in different countries, such as the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Russia and Japan, make use of iconic imagery signifying Islam when marketing books from this country. On the other hand, Turkish book cover designers use illustrations of camels and women in burkas for covers of Arabic translations, geishas and cherry blossom for Japanese, and elephants and cloves for Indian novels. Thus, Orientalist representations are the result of cultural projections, rather than positivistic categorisations.

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Publishing and Cultural Conservatism Given the market-oriented approach adopted by publishers, this situation might seem unavoidable, and a discussion in cultural conservatism might even show it as desirable. Critics subscribing to this theory argue that the book publisher’s role is to select works of high literary quality and make them available to the public—a function referred to as “gatekeeping”. In other words, the publishing profession is seen as a crucial cultural service. Richard Abel points out that publishing has played a central role in Western culture, as the conservator or treasurer of intellectual wealth (Abel 1996, 285). Moreover, he advocates that editors who are preparing texts for publication and encouraging their circulation—through various marketing activities—are actually adding value to them (Ibid., 286). Other critics have described editors as “cosmopolitan intermediaries” facilitating the dissemination of literature (Casanova 2004, 21). Although this view of book editing might sound romantic today, the cultural function attributed to the professionals of this industry is relevant in the context of modern publishing. Seen from this light, British publishers’ efforts to make international authors appealing to a literarily unadventurous reading audience might win sympathy. It is believed that British readers can be “insular or suspicious about what they perceive as being ‘foreign’” (Bratchell 2009). This reluctance might be the outcome of cultural barriers. For example, numerous proper names—people’s, place, institution or brand names— might make it difficult for international readers to follow the plot. At this point, it is important to remember that as a result of the Westernisation process, many readers in non-Western countries are quite familiar with the concepts, names and institutions of North America and Western Europe because they are constantly exposed to these through other media such as TV, films, newspapers and the Internet. On the other hand, it cannot be taken for granted that every Western reader will be familiar with the cultural elements in the Middle East and Asia. There might be literary barriers as well, resulting from the fact that translated novels have been created within other traditions, governed by other norms. This technical impediment usually results in misunderstandings and misrepresentations, which might bring about less pleasurable reading experiences (Casanova 2004, 154). Considering how few translations there are on the market, it might be argued that representation issues are not the priority, if the alternative is not reading world authors at all. Moreover, the emphasis on difference is not limited to the marketing of “foreign” books; the element of historical difference is utilised in promoting nineteenth century English literature as

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well, just as in other publishing industries, which highlight the nostalgic visual elements in promoting historical novels. However, another discussion might help us see things from a different perspective. In the advanced capitalist societies of the West, most people obtain most of their information about social structure from mass media (Murdock and Golding 1979, 12). Karl Marx and Freidrich Engels, who base their social critique on class inequalities, highlight the central role of mass media corporations in the production and distribution of social knowledge: The class which has the means of material production at its disposal has control at the same time over the means of mental production, so that thereby, generally speaking, the ideas of those who lack the means of mental production are subject to it … In so far, therefore, as they rule as a class and determine the extent and compass of an epoch, it is self-evident that they … regulate the production and distribution of the ideas of their age: thus their ideas are the ruling class of the epoch (Marx and Engels 1970, 64-5).

Obviously readers use different strategies for interpreting texts that are based on different epistemologies. For instance, the information in a current affairs magazine article will not be processed in the same way as fiction because the former is intended to relay knowledge about a relatively objective truth, whereas a novel for example, is conceived as the product of an author’s imagination. The same applies to visual representation as well. However, imagined representations are based on realistically intended ones, or at least are perceived to be so; as a result, they cannot be totally divorced from objectivity.

International Literature Seen from the text-type perspective, the use of exoticism in the marketing of translated fiction calls for a discussion in literary theory as well. Literary theorists have attempted to account for the role of power relationships in the international movement of literature and the behaviour of literary texts when introduced to another culture. Pascale Casanova, in her influential book on world literature The World Republic of Letters (2004), discusses the concept of international literary space (Casanova 2004, 9-21). She also uses the term “literary capital”, which might be roughly defined as the accumulation of literary texts that a language or culture has produced:

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Translation scholar Itamar Even-Zohar conceptualises international literary output as a polysystem, which he describes as “a system of various systems which intersect with each other and partly overlap, using concurrently different options, yet functioning as one structured whole, whose members are interdependent” (Even-Zohar 1979, 290). Thus, national literatures are part of a polysystem, with a centre and periphery, and with centrifugal and centripetal powers in place. We may think of multiple centres in this structure, each with relative powers of attraction. Similarly, the literatures of individual languages are also organised as polysystems, again with centres and various strata of peripheries (Ibid., 293). Casanova argues that national literatures have relative amounts of literary capital and the ones with more capital tend to dominate those with less (Casanova 2004, 17-20). For this reason, the world literary space is hierarchical; moreover, language and literature are subject to the relations of political power (Ibid., 39). The relation between languages depends on their relative degree of literariness, while the direction and the amount of the flow of translated texts depends on the difference between the amounts of literary capital that two languages have (Ibid., 134). However, it is impossible to see a binary opposition between the dominator and the dominated in world literary space, since this highly complex structure is rather multi-dimensional (Ibid., 83). Casanova believes that the key to understanding how this literary world operates lies in recognising that its boundaries and its forms of communication do not completely coincide with those of the political and economic world (Ibid., 11). Even-Zohar conceptualizes this situation as the position of translated literature within a polysystem being peripheral. The more established and rigid the home polysystem is, the stronger centrifugal powers it will impose on translated literature. In other words, translated literature will be positioned on the peripheral strata. As a powerful and dominant polysystem, Even-Zohar gives Anglo-American literature as an example, discussing how translations are hereby pushed to the margins (Even-Zohar 1990, 203). If this theory is applied to the book trade, it will be observed that translated books on the market suffer from invisibility and have to find ways to make themselves noticed amid the wealth of literary texts available in the home system. Not surprisingly, the Unique Selling Point of translated

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books happen to be the fact that they have been created in a foreign culture and might also be describing places, people and customs different from those of the home culture. There is evidence that once an author is canonised—either because they have won a prestigious literary award, or because of their success and popularity—their work is no longer represented as exotica. Therefore, they break the trend that has been outlined above. Examples include Orhan Pamuk who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2006, and Murakami Haruki who has created a cult for the British audience. Pamuk’s first novel after his receipt of the literary award, The Museum of Innocence (2010), has appeared in English translation with the cover designed for the original Turkish edition. Murakami’s publisher, Vintage, has been producing Murakami merchandise, and in 2008, published a “Murakami Diary” for his fans. Following their fame, the book covers designed for these authors no longer carry major cultural signifiers because they have been “denationalized” in Casanova’s terms. As a result, one might be tempted to deduce that there exists a trade-off between literary fame and exoticism for authors circulating internationally. However, there are counter-examples to the situation described. Two of the authors discussed in the case studies of book covers are widely acclaimed writers. Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941), besides being a novelist and poet of high literary merit, is also an influential thinker. Naguib Mahfouz (1911-2006) has been described as the “most creative and prolific literary figure in the Arab world” (Salama-Carr 2000, 157) and has enjoyed international success. They both received the Nobel Prize for literature; Tagore in 1913 and Mahfouz in 1988. According to Casanova, they bear the mark of the “unchallenged arbiter of literary excellence” (Casanova 2004, 47). Nevertheless, the covers designed for the translations of their books seem to be highly exoticised. This exception could be analysed in Even-Zohar’s terms. He argues that translated literature as a system is stratified; in other words, there is also a centre and a periphery in the literary space that is known as translated fiction (Even-Zohar 1990, 202). Pascale Casanova explains that each author is an individual case and stands in a particular relation to international literary space (Casanova 2004, 41). Unavoidably, no matter how successful they are, some authors’ books are put in a “literary ghetto”, whereas others enjoy a canonical representation. Considering the fact that translated novels are pushed to the peripheries of literary polysystems, the use of exoticism in marketing these could have implications on the sociology of reading. The exoticness of the books of translated fiction might overshadow their textual function and the tendency of representing foreign fiction as exotica might create and consolidate a

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preconception that translated novels are not to be read for their literary quality, but for their exotic details. This “myth,” in Barthes’ terms (Barthes 1973, 117-26), might lead to a situation where books translated from other languages are enjoyed to the extent that they offer exotic glimpses of the country and the culture of their setting, thus reducing reading almost to a “touristic” activity.

Conclusion We have seen that the dynamics of the book trade in Britain assign a pivotal role to book covers in the marketing and promotion of these cultural products. As a commercial industry aimed at maximising sales, publishers and booksellers seek strategies for selling more translated novels, a sector receiving less attention from the British readership for understandable reasons. Therefore, emphasising the element of foreignness becomes a convenient option. However, this has profound implications on the perception of translated books in popular imagination. Representations of the exotic Other involving iconic imagery may elicit Orientalist perceptions towards the peoples and cultures of the Middle East, as well as East and South Asia. Moreover, novels translated from the languages of these regions are put into marginalised cultural pockets. They will almost certainly alter readers’ expectations from them, eventually leading to a preconditioned reading. Exoticism in marketing translated fiction is a complex phenomenon involving individual cases motivated by decisions from individual publishing companies. It is important to remember that the book covers used in the above case studies are carefully selected examples to illustrate the point and they represent one end of the wide range of possibilities. Translated book packaging strategies which feature culturally-neutral imagery and focus on literary merit are not few. Still, this pattern of focusing on exoticism is worth analysing, by virtue of its wider implications in popular culture.

Works Cited Interviews Bratchell, Roger. 2009. Marketing Literature in Translation. Presented at the London Book Fair, panel titled “The Marketing of Literature in Translation: UK & China”, April 22, in London, the United Kingdom.

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Kilgarriff, Catheryn. 2009. Interview with Author, October 16, 2009.

Printed Sources Abel, Richard. 1996. The Book Publisher’s Cultural Role. Logos 7, 4: 284-8. Abercrombie, Nicholas. 1990. The Privilege of the Producer. In Enterprise Culture, ed. Keat Russel and Nicholas Abercrombie, 171-85. London: Routledge. Adorno, Theodor, and Max Horkheimer. 1979. The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception. In Dialectic of Enlightenment, Adorno, Theodore and Max Horkheimer, 120-67. London: Verso. Barthes, Roland. 1967. Elements of Semiology. London: Cape. —. 1973. Mythologies. London: Paladin. Bhabha, Homi K. 2004. The Other Question: Stereotype, Discrimination and the Discourse of Colonialism. In The Location of Culture, Bhabha, Homi, 94-120. London: Routledge. Casanova, Pascale. 2004. The World Republic of Letters. Cambridge, Mass.; London: Harvard University Press. Clark, Giles. 1994. Inside Book Publishing. London: Blueprint. Clee, Nicholas. 2005. New Wave in Translation. The Bookseller 25 March: 26-7. Even-Zohar, Itamar. 1979. Polysystem Theory. Poetics Today 1, 1-2: 287-310. —. 2004. The Position of Translated Literature within the Literary Polysystem. In The Translation Studies Reader, 2nd edn, ed. Venuti, Lawrence, 199-204. London: Routledge. Fusco, Coco. 2002. The Other History of Intercultural Performance. In The Visual Culture Reader, ed. Mirzoeff, Nicholas, 556-64. London: Routledge. Genette, Gérard. 1997. Paratexts: Thresholds of Interpretation. Cambridge: CUP. Gessel, Van. 2000. Japanese Fiction. In The Oxford Guide to Literature in English Translation, ed. France, Peter, 241-5. New York: Oxford University Press. Lemaire, Gérard-Georges. 2005. Orientalism in the 18th Century. In The Orient in Western Art, Lemaire Gérard-Georges, 47-86. Cologne: Könemann. Marx, Karl, and Friedrich Engels. 1970. Ruling Class, Ruling Ideas. In German Ideology: Part I and Selections from Part II and III, ed. Arthur, Christopher John, 64-8. New York: International.

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Matthews, Nicole. 2007. Introduction to Judging a Book by its Cover, ed. Matthews, Nicole and Nickianne Moody, xi-xxi. Aldershot: Ashgate. Mirzoeff, Nicholas. 2002. Introduction to Part Three. In Visual Culture Reader, ed. Mirzoeff, Nicholas, 473-80. London: Routledge. Murdock, Graham, and Peter Golding. 1979. Capitalism, Communication and Class Relations, In Mass Communication and Society, ed. Curran, James, Michael Gurevitch and Janet Woollacott, 12-43. Beverly Hills: Sage. Paker, Saliha. 2000. Turkish. In The Oxford Guide to Literature in English Translation, ed. France, Peter, 619-24. New York: Oxford University Press. Phillips, Angus. 2007. How Books are positioned in the Market: Reading the Cover. In Judging a Book by its Cover, ed. Matthews, Nicole and Nickianne Moody, 19-30. Aldershot: Ashgate. Pickford, Susan. 2007. Jerome K. Jerome and the Paratextual Staging of Anti-Elitism. In Judging a Book by its Cover, ed. Matthews, Nicole and Nickianne Moody, 83-94. Aldershot: Ashgate. Powers, Alan. 2001. Front Cover: Great Book Jacket and Cover Design. London: Mitchell Beazley. Roberts, Mary. 2007. Pleasures in Detail. In Intimate Outsiders: The Harem in Ottoman and Orientalist Art and Travel Literature, Roberts, Mary, 59-79. Durham and London: Duke University Press. Rodinson, Maxime. 2002. Western Views of the Muslim World. In Europe and the Mystique of Islam, Rodinson, Maxime, 3-82. New York: I.B. Tauris. Said, Edward. 1979. Orientalism. New York: Vintage Books. Salama-Carr, Myriam. 2000. Naguib Mahfouz. In The Oxford Guide to Literature in English Translation, ed. France, Peter, 157-8. New York: Oxford University Press. Starkey, Paul. 2000. Arabic: Modern Literature. In The Oxford Guide to Literature in English Translation, ed. France, Peter, 152-7.New York: Oxford University Press. Strinati, Dominic. 2004. Barthes, Semiology and Popular Culture. In An Introduction to Theories of Popular Culture, Strinati, Dominic, 96-107. London: Routledge. Trivedi, Harish. 2000. Modern Indian Languages. In The Oxford Guide to Literature in English Translation, ed. France, Peter, 459-66. New York: Oxford University Press. Venuti, Lawrence. 1998. Strategies of Translation. In Routledge Encyclopedia of Translation Studies, ed. Baker, Mona, 240-4. Abingdon: Routledge.

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Weedon, Alexis. 2007. In Real Life: Book Covers in the Internet Bookstore. In Judging a Book by its Cover, ed. Matthews, Nicole and Nickianne Moody, 117-28. Aldershot: Ashgate. Wu, Yenna. 2000. Chinese Fiction. In The Oxford Guide to Literature in English Translation, ed. France, Peter, 232-5. New York: Oxford University Press.

Internet Sources Random House Ltd. 2006. Vintage East. http://www.randomhouse.co.uk/vintageeast/ (accessed November 23, 2009).

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Fig. 13-1. Web site designed for Vintage East Collection, launched in 2006 by Vintage. Used by permission of The Random House Group Ltd.

Fig. 13-2. The cover of Palace of Desire by Naguib Mahfouz (Black Swan, 1998). Used by permission of The Random House Group Ltd.

CONTRIBUTORS

Anja Eisenbeiß is a sometime Lecturer in European art history at Heidelberg University and currently a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the University’s Karl Jaspers Centre for Advanced Transcultural Studies, where she co-coordinates a project on Images of Alterity in East and West. Her educational background is in Art History, Classical Archaeology and Philosophy, and her research interests include knowledge transfer in and by media, portraiture and art patronage at the Hapsburg courts. Her recent projects focus on the visuality of otherness, superstition and magical thinking in late medieval French manuscripts of Saint Augustine’s City of God and early modern prodigy literature. Her most recent publication is a co-edited volume on The Power of Things and the Flow of Cultural Transformations: Art and Culture between Europe and Asia (2010). Michelle Ying Ling Huang is currently Research Assistant Professor at the Academy of Visual Arts, Hong Kong Baptist University. In 2010-11, she was Visiting Assistant Professor at the Department of Fine Arts, University of Hong Kong. She studied Marketing and Humanities at the Hong Kong University of Science and Techonlogy, and obtained her Ph.D. in Art History from the University of St Andrews. Her research interests include the transmission and influence of East Asian art in the West, the collections and exhibitions of Chinese pictorial art in Europe and America, as well as the historiography of Chinese painting. Her recent articles appeared in the Journal of the History of Collections 22 (2010) and Orientations 41 (2010). SeungJung Kim is currently an Art Humanities Teaching Fellow at Columbia University. She is now writing her dissertation on “Concepts of Time in Greek Art”, where she explores philosophical, cultural, scientific and literary notions of Time, current in Archaic and Classical Greece, and their manifestation in the visual arts. Trained as a Classical art historian and archaeologist, she is also interested in cross-cultural studies that challenge the traditional boundaries of academic disciplines; her current focus aims at providing new theoretical and practical insight into the phenomenon of Gandharan art from a renewed Classical standpoint. Prior to her pursuits in Classical Archaeology, she studied Astrophysics and obtained her Ph.D. from Princeton University.

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Contributors

Kristina Kleutghen earned her Ph.D. in History of Art and Architecture from Harvard University in 2010, with a specialization in Chinese art. Her research focuses on late imperial Chinese art and visual culture, particularly China’s pictorial responses to European art during the eighteenth, nineteenth, and early twentieth centuries. Currently she is Assistant Professor of Art History and Archaeology at Washington University in St. Louis. Konstanze Amelie Knittler is currently a Consultant Lecturer on Chinese Ceramics at Sotheby’s Institute of Art, London. She studied Western Art History and English in Vienna, where she graduated with an M.Phil. in Art History in 2001. She continued to pursue postgraduate study in Connoisseurship and Collecting at Sotheby’s Institute of Art, London. In 2006, she was awarded a Leverhulme Ph.D. scholarship at the University of Glasgow. Her Ph.D. thesis (2011) focuses on the motivations and collecting patterns of three British collectors in the field of Chinese ceramics. Further research interests include the American and British art markets in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Shinya Maezaki is currently a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Ritsumeikan University in Kyoto. He received his Ph.D. from the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London in 2009. His research focuses on Japanese ceramic production and its transcultural and transnational relationships from the late nineteenth to the early twentieth century. His Ph.D. thesis, “Qing-style Porcelain in Meiji Japan: The Ceramic Art of Seifu Yohei III”, examines Sino-Japanese aspects of the works by Seifu Yohei III, the first ceramic artist appointed to a position of the Artist for the Imperial Household, or teishitsu gigei’in. His current project is to create a digital image database of Japanese ceramics in Western collections (http://www.arc.ritsumei.ac.jp/jcdb/). Princess Akiko of Mikasa is currently a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Ritsumeikan University. She completed her D. Phil. in Japanese art at the University of Oxford in 2010. Her main research interests include Western interest in Japanese art in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and the creation of the image of Kyoto. Her major publication “Hyǀhon kara bijutsu e: 19 seiki no Nihon bijutsu shnjshnj, tokuni Anderson Collection no igi ni tsuite” appeared in Kokka 1360 (2009).

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Sarah Sau Wah Ng received academic training in Management, Art Conservation, and Art History in her undergraduate and postgraduate degrees. She is currently pursuing, under a Bei Shan Tang scholarship, her Ph.D. in Art History at the University of Oxford. Her research interests include the Manchu elements in Qing imperial paintings and the conservation practices on bronze objects in British and Chinese museums. Her doctoral dissertation addresses major issues on the history of copies of calligraphy, particularly rubbing collections, in Ming China. AnnMarie Perl is currently a doctoral candidate at the Institute of Fine Arts, researching a dissertation under the supervision of Linda Nochlin on showmanship in postwar French art. She received her B.A. from Columbia University’s Columbia College in 2006, and her M.A. from New York University’s Institute of Fine Arts in 2008. Yayoi Shionoiri is the Assistant General Counsel to the Guggenheim Museum. Previously, she served as Legal Advisor to artist Takashi Murakami. With research focusing on modern and contemporary Japanese art, she is interested in the effects of legal paradigms on artistic production, examining the efficacy of the current copyright and intellectual property framework for the protection of artist’s rights. Expanding her scholarship to encompass artist’s freedom of expression, she is currently publishing research on Akasegawa Genpei’s negotiation of modern censorship in the Japanese legal system. She has an A.B. from Harvard University, a J.D. from Cornell Law School and an M.A. in Modern Art from Columbia University. Samine Tabatabaei is a doctoral candidate in the Department of Art History and Communication Studies at McGill University under the supervision of Professor Amelia Jones. Her work deals with post-revolutionary art and culture of Iran. Her research interests include the representation and performance of gender and identity, phenomenology of time and space, matter and memory, as well as durationality in spectatorship and technological contingencies of media art and its relation to the body. Duygu Tekgül studied Translation and Interpreting at Bo÷aziçi University, Istanbul, and Publishing at Oxford Brookes University, Oxford. She is currently writing up her Ph.D. dissertation on the production and reception of translated literature in contemporary Britain at the Department of Sociology and Philosophy, University of Exeter. Her research interests include literary sociology, Translation Studies and Turkish literature.

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Contributors

Pei-Ti Wang is currently teaching at the Graduate Institute of Gender Studies at Kaohsiung Medical University, Taiwan. She received her Ph.D. in Sociology from the Graduate Center, City University of New York in 2010. Her dissertation “Affective Otaku Labor: The Circulation and Modulation of Affect in the Anime Industry” investigates the transnational otaku, focusing particularly on their fandom activities as “affective labor”, related to the theories of affect, body, and cultural studies. She is specialised in the fields of cultural and media studies, globalisation and gender, sociology of science and technology.

INDEX

Abbey of Saint-Vaast, 42 Abstract Expressionism, 201 Abu Turab al-Hasanı bin Hobi aú-ùirazi, 59 Académie Colarossi, 117 Achimota College, 118 Aesthetic Movement, 140 Ahmet III, 60 Ai, Qimeng. See Sichelbarth, Ignatius Alexander of Macedon, 4, 16, 17, 18, 19, 27 An, Deyi. See Salusti, Jean-Damascène Anderson, William, ix, 80, 81, 84, 86, 90, 91, 92, 93, 94, 95, 97, 101, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108, 109, 110, 250 Descriptive and Historical Catalogue of a Collection of Japanese and Chinese Paintings in the British Museum, 91, 92, 93, 94, 95, 105 The Pictorial Arts of Japan, 81, 84, 91, 94, 105 anime, 12, 13, 213, 214, 215, 216, 217, 218, 219, 220, 221, 222, 223, 224, 225, 226, 227, 229, 252 Akira, 218 Cowboy Bebop, 223 Elfen Lied, 223 EVA, 223 Ghost in the Shell, 218, 223 Gigantor, 218 Kimba, 218 Lucky Star, 224 Ouran High School Host Club, 215

Pokemon, 218 Princess Mononoke, 218 Samurai Champloo, 223 Speed Racer, 218 The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, 224 Whisper of the Heart, 223 Anvari, Haleh, 160, 166 Chadornama, 160, 166 Aphrodite, 24 Apollo, 54, 176, 177 Apollonius, 18, 30 Archbishop of Canterbury, 82, 83 Ariadne, 28 Arts and Crafts Movement, 119 Asahi-yaki kiln, 113 Ashmolean Museum, 3 Attiret, Jean-Denis, 128 Augustus the Strong, 139, 146 Awazu, Kiyoshi, 173 Azuma, Hiroki, 220, 221, 222, 224, 227, 228 Otaku: Japan’s Database Animals, 221, 229 bacchai, 21 bacchanalian, 26 bacchantes, 21, 25, 26 baihua wen, 198 Banksy, 205, 206, 207 Barthes, Roland, 204, 207, 235, 244, 245, 246, 247 Bataille, Georges, 175 Battle of Nicopolis, viii, 6, 38, 39, 58, 59, 65 BƗyezƯd I, 38, 39 Berenson, Bernard, 97, 175, 176, 185 The Italian Painters of the Renaissance, 175, 185

254 Berlin Staatliche Museen, viii, 21, 34 Bibliothèque municipale, Boulogne-sur-Mer, viii, 52 Bibliothèque nationale de France, viii, 38, 50, 51 Binyon, Cicely, 100, 102, 104 Binyon, Laurence, 8, 76, 82, 83, 84, 89, 92, 93, 94, 95, 96, 97, 98, 99, 100, 101, 102, 103, 104, 105, 106 “Chinese Art and Buddhism”, 103, 106 Landscape in English Art and Poetry, 104 Painting in the Far East, 94, 95, 102, 105, 106 The Flight of the Dragon, 102 Binyon, Nicolete, 97, 104 bishoujo, 214, 221 Bishu shanzhuang (Mountain Retreat for Escaping Summer Heat), 129 Blackwell, 14, 236 Boltraffio, Giovanni Antonio, 176 Madonna and Child, 176 Botticelli, Sandro, 175 The Birth of Venus, 175 Boxer Rebellion, 96 Brinkley, Francis, Capt., 95 British Academy, 103 British Institute of Florence, 3 British Legation, 90 British Museum, v, ix, 3, 7, 8, 14, 32, 63, 64, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80, 81, 82, 83, 84, 86, 87, 89, 90, 91, 92, 93, 94, 95, 96, 98, 99, 100, 105, 106, 107, 108, 109, 110, 111, 117, 144, 207 British Museum Quarterly, 83, 84 Buddha, 4, 18, 19, 20, 28, 29, 30, 31 “Apollo-Buddha”, 4, 19, 23 Buddhism, 5, 17, 19, 28, 29, 101, 102, 103, 104, 106 Buddhist jataka stories, 23 Mahayana Buddhism, 27 Zen Buddhism, 102, 103, 104

Index Burghley House, 143, 145, 148 Burlington Fine Arts Club, 89, 106 butoh, 172 Cao, Buxing, 125 Cao, Rui, 125 Cardew, Michael, 114, 115, 116, 117, 118, 119 Casanova, Pascale, 13, 240, 241, 242, 243, 244, 245 The World Republic of Letters, 241, 245 Castiglione, Giuseppe, 126, 127, 128, 130, 131, 132, 136 Çelebi, Fethullah Arif (Arifi), viii, 56, 59, 69 Süleymannâme, viii, 56, 59, 69 Çelebi, Hasan, 57 Changchun yuan (Southern-style Garden of Carefree Spring), 129 Chavannes, Édouard, 97 Chinoiserie, 3, 14, 88 Chogha Zanbil, 163 Christianity, 37, 40, 45 Christie’s, 143 Chnjgnj-ji temple, 83 Chui, Pui Chee, x, 206, 212 Running Script of Su Shi Poem, x, 212 Cité des Dames Master, viii, 38, 41, 47, 50 City of God, 6, 39, 40, 41, 42, 44, 45, 46, 48, 249 Cixi, Empress Dowager, 145, 146 Classicism, 5, 17, 19 Gandharan Classicism, 5, 19 Cleveland Museum of Art, viii, 5, 21, 29, 33 Railing Pillar, viii, 5, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 33 clipeus imago, 27 Cole, Henry, 77 Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, 237 colonialism, 1, 11, 88, 154, 155, 159, 166, 245 Colonna, Michelangelo, 126

Beyond Boundaries: East and West Cross-Cultural Encounters Columbia University, 49, 138, 249, 251 Columbus University, 37 Colvin, Sidney, Sir, 90, 91, 93, 94, 97, 98, 106, 107 Comic World Taiwan, 226 Coomaraswamy, Ananda, 20, 29 Corvinus, Matthias, 54, 57, 58 cosplay, 12, 214, 215, 216, 226 Craft Study Centre, 117, 120 Cultural Other, 2, 6, 10, 37, 153, 154, 155, 163, 166 Cultural Revolution, 193, 200 Dan, George, 114 Dan, Takuma, 76 Daoism, 101, 102 Darius III, 16 David, Percival, Sir, 82 Percival David Foundation, 82, 107 Davies, George R., 144 de Nerval, Gérard, 237 de Poirot, Louis, 128 Delacroix, Eugène, 237 Massacre at Chios, 237 Derrida, Jacques, 201 Diana, 54 Ding, Guanpeng, 128 Dionysos, 5, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 27, 28, 29 Domon, Ken, 172 doujinshi, 12, 214, 215, 216, 219, 222, 225, 226, 227 Duveen, Henry, 142 Duveen, Joseph, 142, 143 Earl of Exeter, 143 East India Company, 88 emblemata, 16 Empress Jia, 96 Famille Noire, vi, ix, x, 9, 10, 138, 139, 140, 141, 142, 143, 144, 145, 146, 147, 149, 150, 151 Famille Verte, 138, 142, 145 Fancy Frontier, 226 fansub, 215 fansubbing, 12, 216

255

Faxian, 18, 30 Fenollosa, Ernest, 79, 95, 101, 106, 186 First World War (World War I), 97 Fitzgerald, F. Scott, 237 Fitzwilliam Museum, 94 Flaubert, Gustave, 237 Florence University of the Arts, 3 Forbidden City, 9, 124, 128, 129, 130, 132, 135 Beitang (French Jesuit Church), 126 Dongtang (East Church), 126 Jianfu gong (Palace of Established Happiness), 130 Jingsheng zhai (Studio of Respectful Victory), 130 Juanqin zhai (Studio of Exhaustion from Diligent Service), 124, 137 Nantang (South Church), 127 Ningshou gong (Palace of Tranquil Longevity), 130 Ruyi guan (Wish-Fulfilling Studio), 128 Yanghejing she (Retreat for Cultivating Harmony), 130 Yangxin dian (Hall of Mental Cultivation), 130 Yucui xuan (Pure Jade Pavilion), 130 Forchtenstein Castle, 61 Foucher, Alfred, 16, 19, 20, 30 L’art greco-Bouddhique du Gandhara, 19, 30 Franks, Augustus Wollaston, Sir, 90, 91, 93, 144, 148 Freer, Charles Lang, 139, 149 French Revolution, 193 Frick, Henry Clay, 139, 142, 144, 149 Fukui, Rikichiro, 97 Fütühat-I Camila, viii, 59, 70 games, 12, 42, 213, 214, 215, 216, 217, 220, 221, 224 ef-a tale of memories, 214

256 Ragnarok Online, 221 Garland, James, 142 geisha, 234, 239 Gérôme, Jean-Léone, 238 Bathing Scene, 238 Ghadirian, Shadi, x, 152, 161, 162, 163, 164, 165, 167 Qajar, x, 161, 167 Gherardini, Giovanni, 126 Giles, Herbert, 97 globalisation, 2, 3, 5, 13, 36, 37, 45, 46, 153, 157, 192, 252 Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von, 237 Golden Hall of Hǀrynj-ji, 7, 80 Gonse, Louis, 95 Gray, Basil, 97, 106 Great Wall. See Wanli changcheng Greater Gandhara, 4, 17, 18 Gu, Gan, x, 193, 201, 210 Opening Up, 193 World of Supreme Bliss, 193 Gu, Kaizhi, ix, 76, 96, 101, 107, 111 Admonitions of the Court Instructress, ix, 8, 76, 77, 83, 96, 97, 98, 101, 104, 106, 107, 111 Gu, Wenda, 193, 201, 202 Guo, Xiaolu, 234 The Village of Stone, 234 Gwynne-Evans, William, Sir, 94 Ha, Jin, 234 Waiting, 234 Hakubutsukyoku, 81 HamadaʿʳShǀji, ix, 114, 118, 121 Hamilton, William Richard, 77 Hammurabi, 164 hanzi, 197, 204 Harvard University, 103, 136, 250, 251 He, Qingtai. See de Poirot, Louis Herakles, 4, 27, 30 Hercules, 54 hetairai, 24 Hijikata, Tatsumi, 172 Hippisley, Alfred, 139 Hokusai, Katsushika, 235

Index The Great Wave Off Kanagawa, 235 Hong Kong Museum of Art, 3, 14, 206 Horae, 175 HorneʿʳFrances, 114 Hǀrynj-ji temple, 7, 79, 80, 81, 84 The Pure Land of Maitreya, 80 Hosoe, Eikoh, x, 11, 170, 171, 172, 173, 174, 175, 177, 178, 179, 180, 181, 183, 184, 185, 186, 187, 188, 189 Barakei, vi, x, 11, 170, 171, 172, 173, 174, 175, 177, 178, 179, 180, 181, 182, 183, 184, 185, 187, 188, 189 Kamaitachi, 171 Otoko to Onna, 171 Huang, Miaozi, 193, 201 Hugo, Victor, 237 Huizong, 102 Hünernâme, viii, 58, 65, 66 Hunyadi, János, viii, 58, 59, 66, 67 Ilantai. See Yi Lantai Imperial College London, 146 Imperial Naval Medical College, 90 Inada, Hogitaro, 104 Ingres, Jean August Dominique, 160 Grande Odalisque, 160 Institute of Art Research, 104 Inten, 81 Iran-Iraq War, 10, 156, 160 Jacquemart, Albert, 138, 148 Japan Photo Critics Association, 172 Japonisme, 88, 97, 107 Jesus, 176, 177 Jin, Tingbiao, 128 Johnson, Clarence A. K. Capt., 96 Kangxi, x, 10, 126, 139, 140, 141, 143, 144, 145, 146, 147, 150 Kanishka, 18 Kano School, 78 kantharos, 23 Kawabata, Yasunari, 183 kawaii, 222 Kiarostami, Abbas, 157

Beyond Boundaries: East and West Cross-Cultural Encounters King Charles V, 39 Kipling, Rudyard, xiii Kirino, Natsuo, 234 Out, 234 Kiyosato Museum of Photographic Arts, 171 Kohitsu, Ryǀnin, 93, 94, 95, 97 The Kokka, 8, 79, 95, 99, 100, 101, 104, 105, 250 Kose no Hirotaka, 92 krater, 22, 23 Kunsthistorisches Museum, 61 Kushan-Mathura, v, 5, 6, 16, 20, 21 Kyoto City Ceramic Research Institute, 113, 114 Kyoto Porcelain School, 115 Lady Lever Art Gallery, 10, 139, 140, 142, 148 Lahore Museum, 19, 26 laksanas, 19 Lang, Shining. See Castiglione, Giuseppe Laoism, 101, 102 Laozi, 101 Leach Pottery, 8, 112, 113, 114, 115, 116, 117, 118, 119 Leach, Bernard Howell, ix, 8, 112, 114, 115, 116, 117, 118, 119, 120, 121 Lever, William Hesketh, 140, 142, 143, 144, 145, 148 Levni, ix, 60, 62, 72 Li, Longmian, 92 Li, Luogong, 201 Liang, Kai, 102 Limbourg brothers, 43, 47, 48 Litchfield, Frederick, 138, 148 Littlejohn, Stanley, 98, 106 Loqman, Seyyid, viii, 58, 65, 66 Louis II, 56 Lu, Ji, ix, 92, 109 Ma, Chengxiang, 201 Ma, Jian, 235 Red Dust, 235 Ma, Yuan, 102 Macau Ricci Institute, 3

257

Machida, Hisanari, 79, 83 maenad, 21, 22, 24, 25, 26, 30 Ma÷den, Perihan, 235 2 Girls, 235, 238 Mahfouz, Naguib, x, 235, 243, 246, 248 The Cairo Trilogy, 235, 238 Makrizi, 55 Makron, viii, 5, 21, 22, 23, 24, 34 manga, 12, 213, 214, 215, 216, 217, 218, 219, 220, 221, 222, 224, 226, 227, 229 Dragon Ball Z, 217 Fruit Basket, 217 Manuel II, 38, 46 Mao, Zedong, x, 193, 199, 200, 210 Marsyas, 176, 177 Masuda, Sayo, 234 Autobiography of a Geisha, 234 Matsubayashi, Tsurunosuke, vi, xi, 8, 112, 113, 114, 115, 116, 117, 118, 119, 121 Matsubayashi, Shǀsai, 113 Media Create, 214, 216, 229 Megasthenes, 18, 30 Mehmed II, 55 Metropolitan Museum of Art, ix, 17, 61, 64, 73, 147 Mi, Fu, ix, 92, 110 mingei, 112 Mishima, Yukio, vi, 11, 170, 171, 172, 173, 174, 175, 176, 177, 178, 179, 180, 181, 182, 183, 184, 185, 186, 234 Confessions of a Mask, 171 The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea, 234 Mitelli, Agostino, 126 mithuna, 26 moe, 12, 213, 220, 221, 222, 223, 224, 225, 226, 227, 228 Monthly Review, 95, 96 Morgan, John Pierpont, 142 Morimura, Yasumasa, 181, 186 Seasons of Passion/A Requiem Mishima, 181

258 Morrison, Arthur, 94, 95, 96, 97, 106, 107 The Painters of Japan, 94, 95, 105, 106, 107 Morse, Edward, 101 Muhammad, 61 multiculturalism, 2 Munich Glyptothek, viii, 5, 24, 35 Muqi, 102 Murad II, 58 Murad III, 58 Murakami, Haruki, 234, 243 Norwegian Wood, 234 Murakami, Takashi, 221, 229, 251 Little Boy: The Arts of Japan’s Exploding Subculture, 221 Musée Guimet, 3, 30 Museum für Ostasiatische Kunst, 82 Muslim, 37, 41, 43, 44, 45, 47, 56, 63, 159, 164, 236, 246 Mustafa, Celâlzade, 56 Nagas, 25 nakkaúhane, 55 Nasûh, Matrakçı, ix, 59, 60, 61, 71 Süleymannâme, ix, 60, 71 Tuhfat al-Ghuzat, 60 National Art Collections Fund, 82 National Art Museum of China, 201 National Gallery of Victoria, 3, 14 National Gallery, London, 176 National Museum of Scotland, 3 National Palace Museum, Taipei, 135, 139 National Széchényi Library, viii, 58, 62, 68 Nereids, 26, 27 Neshat, Shirin, 157, 159, 160 Chador-dadar, 160, 166 Women of Allah series, 157, 159 New York Public Library, viii, 62, 67 Nicolaus de Lyra, 44 Postilla litteralis, 44 Nietzsche, Friedrich, 182 Nihon bijutsu kyokai (Association of Japanese Art), 95

Index Nihon bijutsu-in (Japan Art Institute), 81, 82, 83, 84, 96 Niiro, Chnjnosuke, ix, 81, 82, 83, 84, 87 Kudara Kannon, ix, 7,81, 82, 83, 87 Ninagawa, Noritane, 79 Noh, 104 Nomura Research Institute, 216, 229 Nyoirin Kannon, 83 Occidentalism, 2, 166 Ogata, Kenzan VI, 114 Ogawa, Yoko, 234 The Housekeeper and the Professor, 234 Okakura, Kakuzo, 8, 79, 81, 95, 96, 99, 101, 102, 103, 107, 186 The Ideals of the East, 8, 101, 102, 103, 104, 107 Okakura, Tenshin. See Okakura, Kakuzo Orientalism, 2, 13, 38, 156, 163, 165, 166, 236, 237, 239, 245 Osman, viii, 58, 59, 64, 65, 66 otaku, vii, 12, 13, 213, 214, 215, 216, 217, 218, 219, 220, 221, 222, 224, 225, 226, 227, 228, 229, 252 Otherness, 6, 13, 14, 41, 45, 153, 155, 163, 237, 238, 249 Otsuka, Eiji, 220, 249 Palace Museum, Beijing, ix, 3, 126, 135, 137 Pamuk, Orhan, 243 The Museum of Innocence, 243 Pan, Tingzhang. See Panzi, Giuseppe Panshan (Mount Pan), 129 Jingsheng xuan (Pavilion for Attracting Victory), 129 Panzi, Giuseppe, 128 Parrhasios, 126, 133 Partridge, Frank, 142, 148 Pelliot, Paul, 97 Persepolis, 163 Perugino, Pietro, 176 Apollo and Marsyas, 176

Beyond Boundaries: East and West Cross-Cultural Encounters Petrucci, Raphaël, 97 Philostratos, 18, 30 Pleydell-Bouverie, Katharine, ix, 114, 115, 116, 117, 118, 120, 121 Poe, Edgar Allan, 237 Pollock, Jackson, 196 Pope, John Alexander, 139, 143, 144, 145, 149 Powell, Cicely Margaret. See Binyon, Cicely Pozzo, Andrea, 126 Pu, Lieping, 193, 201 Works like Dreams, 193 Qianlong, 9, 124, 126, 127, 128, 130, 131, 132, 133, 134, 135, 136, 140 Qiu, Jinxian, 99 Qiu, Zhijie, 202 The Interface series, 202 Writing the “Preface to the Orchid Pavilion” One Thousand Times, 202 qiyun, 125 Quaritch, Bernard, 100 Random House, x, 234, 247, 248 “Vintage East”, 234 Raoul de Presles, 39, 40, 46, 48 Reis, Piri, 57, 60, 63 Renaissance, 7, 11, 37, 47, 54, 58, 77, 78, 126, 175, 185 Ricketts, Charles, 94, 105, 106 Rijksmuseum, 143, 148 Rockefeller, John D., 142, 143 Rossetti, Dante Gabriel, 140 Royal College of Art, 114 Saga Prefectural Ceramic Institute, 117 Said, Edward, xiii, xiv, 13, 153, 166, 237, 239, 246 Orientalism, xiii, xiv, 153, 246 Saint Augustine, viii, 5, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 48, 51, 52, 249 Sakurai, Kǀun, ix, 80, 81, 86 Salting, George, ix, x, 140, 141, 142, 143, 144, 145, 148, 150, 151 Salusti, Jean-Damascène, 128 Santayana, George, 103, 107

259

Interpretations of Poetry and Religion, 103, 107 Saqqakhane Movement, 155, 156 Satow, Ernest, 80, 81, 85 Second World War (World War II), 172, 182, 183, 216, 231 úehnameci, 55 Selim I, 57 Selimnâme, 57 Shah, Nasser al-Din, 162 Shahnama, 55 Shan, Sa, 234 The Girl Who Played Go, 234 Shannon, Charles, 94, 105 Shelley, Percy Bysshe, 237 Shen, Yimo, 193 Shimomura, Kanzan, 96, 104 Shinoyama, Kishin, 177 Shinto-ism, 182 shudao, 195 shufa, 195, 197, 207 shuyi, 195 Sichelbarth, Ignatius, 128 Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor, 38 Sijie, Dai, 234 Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress, 234 Skinner, Edgar, 114 skyphos, 22 Slade School of Art, 114 Soma, 27 South Kensington Museum. See Victoria and Albert Museum St Ives Handicraft Guild, 114 St Sebastian, 177 Stein, Marc Aurel, Sir, 98 Studio Pottery Movement, 112, 117 Süleyman, 54, 55, 56, 57, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64 Summer Palace, Peking. See Yuanming yuan Sun, Guoting, 194 Sun, Quan, 125 Sutton Hoo, 76 Tagore, Rabindranath, 234, 243

260 The Home and the World, 234 Takahashi, Kenzǀ, 99 Taki, Seiichi, 97, 104 Tanaka, Toyozǀ, 80, 97, 185 Tanizaki, Jun’ichiro, 183 Temesvár, 59 Terence du Duc, 40 Tezuka, Osamu, 216 thiasos, 21, 24, 25 Thirty-six Immortal Poets, 76 Thomas of Saluzzo, viii, 38, 50 Le Chevalier Errant, viii, 38, 50 Thuróczy, János, viii, 54, 58, 59, 61, 64, 67, 68 Chronica Hungarorum, viii, 62, 67, 68 Chronicle of the Hungarians, 58, 59, 61, 62, 64 thyrsos, 22, 24 tieluo hua, 127, 136 Tirafkan, Sadegh, x, 152, 161, 163, 164, 166, 168, 169 Hammurabi’s Law Code, x, 164, 166, 168 Iranian Men, x, 164, 168, 169 Tobey, Mark, 202 Tokugawa Shogunate, 88 Tokyo College of Photography, 171 Tokyo Imperial Museum. See Tokyo National Museum Tokyo Imperial University. See University of Tokyo Tokyo National Museum, 7, 78, 80, 81, 82, 85, 93 Tokyo School of Fine Arts, 81, 85, 96 Tǀmatsu, Shǀmei, 171 Tomimoto, Kenkichi, 114 tongjing hua, ix, 9, 124, 125, 127, 128, 129, 130, 132, 133, 134, 135, 137 Topkapi Palace Museum, viii, ix, 65, 66, 69, 71, 72 Topkapi Saray Museum, viii, 56, 62, 70 Tǀyǀ kaiga sǀshi, 80, 85

Index Treaty of Amity and Commerce, 88 Très Riches Heures, 43 trigonus, 23 Tsang, Tsou-choi, x, 205, 206, 208, 212 ukiyo-e, 76, 88, 94, 104 University of Melbourne, 3 University of Michigan, 107, 118 University of Oxford, 94, 113, 116, 250, 251 University of St Andrews, xi, 4, 88, 106, 170, 249 University of Tokyo, 101, 104 Urushibara, Yoshijiro, 98 usnisa, 18, 19 Vajrapani, 28, 30 Vehbi, ix, 60, 72 Surname-I Vehbi, ix, 60, 62, 72 Velásquez, Diego, 181 Venus, 175 Victoria and Albert Museum, ix, x, 1, 10, 77, 85, 117, 119, 137, 138, 140, 146, 148, 150, 151 Virgin Mary, 176 Waley, Arthur, 96, 97 Walt Disney, 216 Wang, Dongling, 201 Wang, Naizhuang, 201 Wang, Nanming, 201 Wang, Xuezhong, 201 Wang, Youxue, ix, 128, 131, 137 Wang, Zhicheng. See Attiret, Jean-Denis Wanli changcheng, 129, 234 Wei, Ligang, 193, 201 Wei’s Squares, 193 Wen, Zheng, ix, 92, 110 wenyan wen, 198 Whistler, James Abbot McNeill, 107, 140, 141 Whyte, Alexander, 82 Widener, P.A.B., 142 Winchcombe Pottery, 118 Wölfflin, Heinrich, 196, 201 wucai, 138 Xia, Gui, 102

Beyond Boundaries: East and West Cross-Cultural Encounters Xiangshan (Fragrant Mountain), 129 Xie, He, 76, 77 Old Record of the Classification of Painters, 77 Xie, Yun, 201 Xinran, 234 The Good Women of China, 234 Xu, Bing, x, 12, 192, 193, 202, 203, 204, 205, 207, 211 Book from the Sky, x, 203, 211 Square Word Calligraphy, 192, 203, 205 Xu, Mao, 125 Xuanzang, 18, 31 Xun, Xu, 125 Yaksha, 25, 26, 29 Yamanaka & Co. Ltd., 104 yamato-e, 80 Yao, Wenhan, 128 yaoi, 222 Yashiro, Yukio, 104 Yi, Lantai, ix, 128, 132, 137 Xiyang lou shuifa tu (Pictures of the European Palaces and Waterworks), ix 132, 137

261

Hudong xianfa hua (Perspective Paintings East of the Lake), ix, 133, 137 yin-yang, 201 yitizi, 204 Yokoo, Tadanori, 173 Yongzheng, 126, 130, 140 Yuanming yuan, 128, 131, 132, 133, 135 Xiyang lou (European Palaces), ix, 132, 137 Ynjbi, Tanaka, 80 Yuezhi, 17, 18, 28 Zapolya, János, 54 Zen, 102, 103, 104 Zephyrs, 175 Zeuxis, 126, 133 Zhang, Dawo, 201 Zhang, Ding, 201 Zhang, Hua, 96 Zhang, Qiang, 201, 203 Zhongnanhai (Central and South Seas park), 129 Zhu, Naizheng, 201 Zurkhane (House of Strength), 164