Film | La Mort de Louis XIV
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La Mort de Louis XIV, directed by Albert Serra with Jean-Pierre Leaud, Patrick D’Assumcao, Marc Susini, Irene Silvagni, Bernard Belin, and Jacques Henric. Capricci Production, 112 minutes.
August 1715. After going for a walk, Louis XIV feels a pain in his leg. The next days, the King keeps fulfilling his duties and obligations, but his sleep is troubled and he has a serious fever. He barely eats and weakens increasingly. This is the start of the slow agony of the greatest King of France, surrounded by his relatives and doctors.
The agony of Louis XIV starts on August 9th 1715, and lasts until September 1st. It marks the end of a personal reign that lasted 72 years—the longest in French history. The of official diary of the Health of the King, which was held by its successive doctors, reveal that Louis XIV had a fragile health and almost died on numerous occasions: from syphilis at the age of five, from a maligned fever at thirty-five, from a fistula at forty-five, and from diabetes with gangrene complications at seventy. This time, at the start of August 1715, Louis XIV suffers from an embolism in his leg due to cardiac arrhythmia, which will start the gangrene.
The press kit is available as a PDF file here»
From Boyd van Hoeij’s review (19 May 2016) for The Hollywood Reporter:
The good news is that The Death of Louis XIV (La Mort de Louis XIV) isn’t only the ultra-arthouse director’s first feature in which he works with professional actors instead of amateurs, but it’s also by far Serra’s most accessible work to date. Buyers and programmers familiar with the auteur will of course understand this hardly puts the film, essentially a death-chamber piece, in Avengers territory, though commercial prospects are certainly better than usual.
The film’s only exterior sequence comes at the very start, as the 76-year-old Louis XIV (French New Wave legend Jean-Pierre Leaud) surveys his famous gardens at Versailles, which were partially constructed during his 72-year reign. He’s in a proto-wheelchair because his leg already hurts and it certainly can’t be a coincidence that the monarch’s overlooking his estate in the twilight hours before retiring to the palace, a place he’ll only leave again a fortnight later, a dead man.
For almost the entire film that follows, Serra keeps the viewers inside the king’s bedroom, with practically no expeditions to even the adjacent room and corridors. The claustrophobic setting within what viewers presumably know is a vast expanse of real estate (which in turn was a tiny fleck of property within the Kingdom of France), is clearly meant to humanize the man who believed he ruled France by divine right but who, in his waning days and hours, looked just like millions of others on their deathbed. . .
The full review is available here»
Fake Furniture at Versailles?
When I first started thinking about what a reformatted newsletter for the Historians of Eighteenth-Century Art & Architecture might include, I began asking other HECAA members. An esteemed colleague answered immediately, “More gossip!”As much as I liked the response, I’m afraid there’s been very little gossip published here at Enfilade over the past seven years. Yet nothing seems to drive whisperings in the art world like a forgery scandal; and Paris is in the midst of one, with allegations that fake eighteenth-century furniture was sold to Versailles. That the story is receiving widespread coverage in the press and has become a proper legal matter, complete with press releases, probably suggests it’s moved on from the mere gossip stage. Sarah Cascone reported on the story for ArtNet News (10 June 2016), and here’s weekend coverage by Georgina Adam for the Financial Times (19 June 2016) . . . . –CH
Louis Delanois, Chair made for Madame du Barry, the mistress of Louis XV, ca. 1769 (Versailles)
A scandal over faked 18th-century French furniture has erupted in Paris, with a couple of eminent specialists under investigation for the alleged making and sale of counterfeit chairs, some of which were bought by Versailles.
One of those under investigation is Bill Pallot, who works for the venerable antique dealer Didier Aaron, which has spaces in Paris, London and New York. Pallot is an art historian, collector, lecturer at the Sorbonne and the author of numerous books on antique furniture, including the reference volume on 18th-century chairs. He is a sworn expert for law courts and a member of both the French antique dealers’ association the Syndicat National des Antiquaires and the Syndicat Français des Experts Professionnels. Both professional bodies have vowed to “take the necessary measures” if the accusations are proved.
The other suspect is Laurent Kraemer, co-director of Kraemer Gallery, a prominent 141-year-old family firm of antique dealers. A master craftsman in the Faubourg St Antoine, a district famed for making furniture of all sorts, supposedly produced the pieces in question.
At issue are six pieces now in Versailles, along with two others that were sold by Kraemer. These two chairs were apparently copied from genuine ones already in Versailles; in 2013 they were listed as national treasures by the authorities and export barred, but were ultimately not bought by the palace because of their hefty price: €1m each.
In a laconic press release, the French Ministry of Culture admitted that Versailles had spent €2.7m, between 2008 and 2012, on furniture that is “implicated” in an investigation by the French cultural police unit (OCBC). . .
The full article from the Financial Times is available here»
Lecture Programme for Art Antiques London, 2016
Art Antiques London
Albert Memorial West Lawn, Kesington Gardens, 24–30 June 2016
Albert Memorial and Kensington Gardens once again provide the stunning backdrop to one of London’s most exciting and glamorous art and antique fairs. Held in a beautiful bespoke pavilion opposite the Royal Albert Hall and close to the site of the Great Exhibition of 1851, Art Antiques London brings together leading international dealers and discerning visitors from all over the world, who can buy with confidence at this strictly vetted sumptuous summer showcase for the arts. The fair is complemented with a full lecture programme.
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Saturday, 25 June 2016, 11.30–12.30
Elisabetta Dal Carlo (Curator, The Fondazione Querini Stampalia, Venice), “Geminiano Cozzi, His Manufactory, and Its Porcelain”
During the eighteenth century, the Serenissima Repubblica was the only State which boasted no less than four porcelain factories, and it is remarkable that none of them had been founded by public decree, but by private initiative. The manufactory founded by Geminiano Cozzi in 1763 achieved a great success in Venice and was active until 1812. The factory was located in San Giobbe, Canaregio and followed a strict trade policy in order to exclude foreign imports in the Venetian market. The lecture will present the story of the manufactory, its huge production of high quality porcelain decorated with rich and brilliant colours, and will focus on the finest pieces featuring all the Venetian charm.
Almost 250 years later, Venice has dedicated a fascinating exhibition to this extraordinary entrepreneur which explores the long activity of the factory and recognizes its rightful place among other European manufactures. The exhibition is the first retrospective on the Cozzi manufactory and offers the public more than 600 items on view, an important collection from national and international museums, enriched by rare pieces from private collections that have never been displayed before. It takes place in Venice, Ca’Rezzonico, Museo del Settecento veneziano from March 18th to July 12th 2016.
Elisabetta Dal Carlo is an art historian, a scholar of decorative arts between baroque and neoclassical styles and a specialist in eighteenth-century ceramics. Curator, Fondazione Querini Stampalia, Venice. She graduated in History of Art at Ca’Foscari University in Venice, and she obtained her Ph.D. in History of Art at Siena University. She lectured in Italy and abroad (London and Paris) on the art of porcelain and she edited some catalogues of decorative arts collections and various publications on Venetian and Veneto art history.
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Saturday, 25 June 2016, 3.00–4.00
Suzanne Findlen Hood (Curator of Ceramics and Glass, Colonial Williamsburg Foundation), “Ceramic Treasures from the Colonial Williamsburg Collection”
Colonial Williamsburg’s collections illuminate our understanding of colonial Virginia and the larger Anglo-American world. In addition to objects of everyday life, Williamsburg has also collected the finest British and American arts. Explore the treasures of Colonial Williamsburg’s ceramics collection from porcelain produced by Chelsea, Bow, and Worcester to exceptional English delft. From a first edition Portland vase, to seventeenth-century German stoneware, Williamsburg’s collection is full of masterpieces that illustrate that teapots and plates are more than just dishes. This lecture will reacquaint you with some old friends and introduce you to some of Colonial Williamsburg’s lesser known strengths. With two museums and more than eighty eighteenth-century buildings, ‘collecting colonial’ in the twenty-first century offers a world of variety.
Suzanne Findlen Hood is the curator of ceramics and glass at Colonial Williamsburg. She has had the privilege of working at Colonial Williamsburg since 2002. Ms. Hood holds a B.A. in history from Wheaton College in Massachusetts and an M.A. from the Winterthur Program in Early American Culture and the University of Delaware. Prior to coming to Colonial Williamsburg, Ms. Hood was employed at The Chipstone Foundation in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Her research has focused on ceramics owned and used in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century America with a particular emphasis on archaeological ceramics, Chinese export porcelain, salt-glazed stoneware, and British pottery. Ms. Hood is co-author with Janine Skerry of Salt-glazed Stoneware in Early America, winner of the American Ceramic Circle Book Award for 2009. Her most recent exhibition, China of the Most Fashionable Sort: Chinese Export Porcelain in Colonial America, is currently on view at the DeWitt Wallace Decorative Arts Museum, one of the Art Museums of Colonial Williamsburg.
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Monday, 27 June 2016, 11.30–12.30
Rosalind Sword (BA Cantab, Author and Lecturer), “Coloured Worcester Porcelain of The First Period: The H.R. Marshall Collection at The Ashmolean Museum”
To celebrate the publication of the new Worcester catalogue of the H.R. Marshall Collection at the Ashmolean Museum in August, Rosalind Sword will talk about the highlights of the Marshall collection. Drawing on Marshall’s own papers, the speaker will give further insights into how this amazing, academic, and encyclopaedic collection was formed. Highlights to be discussed will include a rare garniture of five vases decorated by James Giles with naturalistic birds, the ‘Grubbe’ tea jar also by Giles (its partner is in the Museum of Royal Worcester), O’Neale Vases and dishes, a Duvivier signed and decorated teapot, a teapot from the Theatrical Service, and an amazing pair of candlesticks in under-glaze blue. Particular attention will be paid to rare items from the first ten years of the factory such as a Wigornia type cream boat, a large jug decorated with the Stag Hunt pattern, a cylindrical vase with European Figures possibly decorated by O’Neale, tall vases, and many covetable small bottles and dishes of different shapes and decoration. Examples of other items of great interest to Marshall will also be discussed such as comparative or prototype pieces from other factories and armorial porcelain not featured in depth in his own book. This unparalleled 20th-century collection, now re-displayed for the 21st century viewer in the Ashmolean, is an amazing insight into this extraordinary Worcester collection.
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Monday, 27 June 2016, 5.15–6.30
“Face to Face: Dame Rosalind Savill in Conversation with Richard, 10th Duke of Buccleuch and 12th Duke of Queensberry”
In this conversation Dame Rosalind and the 10th Duke of Buccleuch will discuss the extraordinary task of preserving and presenting four most wonderful houses and their sumptuous art treasures in the United Kingdom: Boughton House (The English Versailles), Drumlanrig Castle, Bowhill and Dalkeith Palace in Scotland. His legacy will not simply be one of stewardship and scholarship but also creating innovative exciting landscape projects.
Dame Rosalind Savill DBE, FBA, FSA, Curator Emeritus, The Wallace Collection, London, became a Museum Assistant in the Ceramics Department of the Victoria and Albert Museum in 1973, moving to the Wallace Collection in 1974. There she worked for thirty-seven years, becoming an Assistant Director in 1979 and Director in 1992, and retired in 2011. Her major publication is The Wallace Collection: Catalogue of Sèvres Porcelain, 3 vols, 1988, which won her the National Art-Collection Fund prize for Scholarship in 1990; she has written numerous articles and papers, chiefly on Sèvres porcelain. In 1990 she became a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries, in 2000 she was awarded a CBE for Services to the Study of Ceramics, in 2006 she became a Fellow of the British Academy, and in 2009 she was awarded a DBE for Services to the Arts. She has Visiting Professorships from the University of Buckingham and the University of the Arts London, won the European Woman of Achievement Award (Arts and Media) 2005 and was a Member of the Conseil d’Administration at Sèvres Cité de la Céramique. Currently her Trusteeships include: the Royal Collection Trust, the Buccleuch Living Heritage Trust and The Wallace Collection Foundation. Dame Rosalind is also President of the French Porcelain Society and of the Academic Committee at Waddesdon Manor.
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Tuesday, 28 June 2016, 11.00–5.00
“The English Ceramics Circle: Study Day | A Taste for the Antique, The Neo-classical Style, and Ceramics in England, ca. 1770–1800″
• Matthew Martin (Curator, NG Victoria), Introduction
• Oliver Fairclough (Hon. Research Fellow, N M Wales), ‘A Very Masterly Stile’: The British Taste for Sèvres Porcelain, 1760–1790
• James Lomax (F.S.A., Emeritus Curator of Collections at Temple Newsam House), The Neo-classical Style and Ceramics at Temple Newsam
• Diana Edwards (porcelain researcher and author), Dry-bodied Pottery
• Leslie Grigsby (Senior Curator of Ceramics and Glass, Winterthur), Some Neo-classical Sources
• Roger Massey (porcelain researcher and author), Derby Bisque Figures
• Patricia Ferguson (ceramics advisor to the National Trust), Vases and Garnitures
• Nicholas Panes (porcelain researcher and author), Bristol Porcelain
Tickets (including a three-course dinner) £110 ECC members. £135 non-ECC members; lectures only £70 ECC members, £85 non-ECC members. For further information please visit the English Ceramics Circle website. Booking information is available here.
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Wednesday, 29 June 2016, 11.30–12.30
Sally Kevill-Davies (Independent writer and researcher), “Chelsea ‘Hans Sloane’ Botanical Porcelain: Visions of Arcadia and America in the English Landscape Garden”
Marking the 300th anniversary of the birth of Lancelot (‘Capability’) Brown (1716–1783), this lecture examines the influx of unknown American trees and shrubs into England during the first decades of the eighteenth century. This was initiated largely by Peter Collinson (1694–1768), a London cloth merchant with a passion for botany, in response to the Enlightenment interest in the natural world, and the desire by English aristocrats to find trees and shrubs with which to adorn their estates in the new fashion for landscape gardening. Through his American contacts Collinson was put in touch with John Bartram (1699–1777), a Pennsylvania farmer, whom he paid to go on hazardous expeditions into virgin territory in search of new plants. These were shipped across the Atlantic, and were eagerly cultivated by London nurserymen, Philip Miller at the Chelsea Physic Garden, and Collinson himself, for distribution to the aristocracy for their fashionable landscape gardens. Many of the plants were painted by Georg Dionysius Ehret (1708–1770) and later engraved, and these images were copied onto porcelain at Nicholas Sprimont’s Chelsea porcelain factory during the 1750s. Thus, the sensational new plants of the American wilderness and of the landscape garden were, for a few years, pictured at the tables of elite Society.”
Sally Kevill-Davies started her ceramic career as a specialist at Sotheby’s, where she worked for nine years. She also worked on re-cataloguing the English porcelain at the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge and organised an exhibition of Chelsea porcelain for the Chelsea Festival, 1999. She wrote the catalogue, Sir Hans Sloane’s Plants on Chelsea Porcelain for an exhibition in June 2015.
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Wednesday, 29 June 2016, 3.00–4.00
Katharina Hantschmann (Curator for Ceramics at the Bavarian National Museum, Munich and The Ernst Schneider Collection of Meissen Porcelain, Lustheim Castle), “Chinese and Meissen Porcelain of the Bavarian Elector Karl Albrecht: An Exercise in Propaganda”
When in 1740 the German Emperor Karl VI died without a male heir, it was the only time in modern history that a member of the Habsburg family was not elected emperor but one of the other German electors, the Bavarian ruler Karl Albrecht (1697–1745). He substantiated his claim to the title of emperor by detailing familial relationships dating back to the sixteenth century. His dynastic ambitions are reflected in the prestigious and magnificent developments he made to the Munich court decades before, such as commissioning the building of the Reiche Zimmer (‘rich apartment’) in 1730. Also his acquisitions and presentations of exceptional Chinese and Meissen porcelain services bear witness to the elector’s aspirations. A unique service magnificently etched with Augsburg gold decoration on Chinese and Meissen porcelain was probably displayed on a buffet on festive occasions. The Bavarian electors were also early owners of Meissen porcelain, such as four early tea services with Chinese scenes, two presently displayed in the Munich Residenz on tiered silver stands. Was all this an exercise in propaganda? The speaker will explore these aspirations.
Katharina Hantschmann MA, PhD: Curator of Ceramics at the Bavarian National Museum, Munich and The Ernst Schneider Collection of Meissen Porcelain, Lustheim Castle from 1984.
Exhibition | Geminiano Cozzi and His Porcelain
Now on view at Ca’ Rezzonico:
Geminiano Cozzi and His Porcelain / Geminiano Cozzi e le Sue Porcellane
Ca’ Rezzonico, Museo del Settecento Veneziano, Venice, 9 March – 12 July 2016
Curated by Marcella Ansaldi and Alberto Craievich
Porcelain is perhaps the material that best embodies the spirit and aesthetic of the eighteenth century: glossy and light, it naturally lends itself to the creation of objects characterised by elegant, flowing lines. For long kept a secret by Chinese manufacturers, it was re-created in Europe in the second decade of the eighteenth century at the Saxon court of Augustus the Strong and from there gradually spread across the continent, despite desperate attempts to hide the formula. During the eighteenth century, the Venetian Republic was the only state to have no less than four porcelain factories, all of them opened by private initiative. One of these was that of Geminiano Cozzi (1728–1798), born in Modena but Venetian by choice. It is to his extraordinary activity as an entrepreneur ante litteram that the Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia is now dedicating the first ever retrospective, 250 years after the privilege granted to him by the Republic in 1765 (and which marks the real birth of the Cozzi manufacture).
It is no coincidence that the exhibition should be presented in the pòrtego on the first floor of Ca’ Rezzonico, the Museo del Settecento Veneziano, a venue that in terms of its form and history is the best-suited to celebrating one of the most fascinating aspects of eighteenth-century art. Curated by Marcella Ansaldi and Alberto Craievich, the exhibition features over six hundred pieces from Italian and foreign museums, including the few items to have a firm date and the many still in private collections and hitherto difficult of access to the public and to scholars, a circumstance that has not helped the fortune critique of Cozzi: only today is his work as artist and manufacture being being its due recognition within the European scene. Unfolding in a development that is both chronological and thematic, the exhibition shows the evolution of Cozzi’s manufacture and of the types of decoration and various items, highlighting on the one hand one of the most fascinating art-historical events of the eighteenth century, and on the other by presenting an overview of a manufacturing activity of the period that includes items of surprising modernity.
The development of the art of porcelain in the eighteenth century in the Venetian Republic was undertaken by figures who were controversial, stubborn and fascinating. One of these was the Giovanni Vezzi, goldsmith and merchant, who in 1720 started his own production in Venice. Another was Nathaniel Friederich Hewelcke, a Saxon merchant who emigrated in 1757 from Meissen because of the closure of the factory during the Seven Years War; he requested and obtained a twenty-year privilege to manufacture “Saxon porcelain of any and all types” in Venice. And aside from the aforementioned Geminiano Cozzi, we might also mention Giovanni Battista Antonibon, who in 1762 started production in Nove (VI) thirty years after obtaining the privilege from the Serenissima’ “Savi della Mercanzia” for the production of high-quality majolica quality for twenty years without having to pay taxes (1732). Their destiny, however, despite the qualitatively extraordinary work, was not so lucky: after a few years, Vezzi and Hewelcke were obliged to abandon their businesses because of debts, and only Antonibon in Nove and Cozzi in Venice were able to establish long-lasting businesses, despite encountering difficulties on the way.
Marcella Ansaldi and Alberto Craievich, Geminiano Cozzi e le Sue Porcellane (Crocetta del Montello: Antiga Edizioni, 2016), 384 pages, ISBN: 978-8897784890, $72.
Tom Stammers on Jean-Charles Davillier
Thomas Stammers | Baron Jean-Charles Davillier: A Paragon
and Historian of Taste in Nineteenth-Century France
The Wallace Collection, London, 25 June 2016
The French Porcelain Society is delighted to announce this year’s Sir Geoffrey de Bellaigue Memorial Lecture to be presented by Dr. Thomas Stammers, Durham University, entitled “Baron Jean-Charles Davillier: A Paragon and Historian of Taste in Nineteenth-Century France.”
Baron Jean-Charles Davillier (1823–83) was a pioneering figure in the Second Empire, not simply through his forays into neglected fields—such as Spanish decorative arts—but also through the self-consciousness and erudition he brought to the study of collecting. His landmark publications on the celebrated cabinets and sales of the old regime demonstrate how nineteenth-century amateurs situated themselves in a lineage stretching back, across the revolution, to the ancien régime. This paper situates Davillier within the context of French mid-century collecting, characterized by its expanding geographical reach and heightened emphasis on selection and discernment. It will consider his methods and sources as an historian, and relate his scholarship to both other nascent attempts to write the history of collecting, and to wider cultural politics, not least the violent events of the Franco-Prussian War and the Commune. It will conclude by considering Davillier the patriot, and the controversy that engulfed the donation of his collections to the Louvre and to Sèvres in 1883. Davillier’s career and research are central for understanding how French porcelain was revered as both an aesthetic and technical marvel, and also as an historical document.
Tom Stammers is a cultural historian of France from the Revolution down to the end of the nineteenth century.
The free lecture will be held at The Wallace Collection, Hertford House, Manchester Square, London, W1U 3BN, on Saturday 25 June 2016 at 7:00–8:00pm. To reserve a place, please email fpsmailing@gmail.com.
At Auction | Chinese Export ‘Lady Washington States China’ Plate
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Martha Washington’s Birthday was last Monday (13 June 1731). A plate from her tea service sold earlier in the month at Grogan and Company:
A rare Chinese export ‘Lady Washington States China’ plate led the Grogan & Company’s June 5 auction in Boston. Capturing the attention of public institutions and private collectors alike, the ‘Lady Washington States China’ plate soared above its $25,000–50,000 pre-sale estimate when it fetched $244,000 in The June Auction (Sale 154, Lot 37). The plate is an example from Martha Washington’s porcelain tea service of approximately 40 pieces, presented to her in April 1796 by the Dutch trader Andreas van Braam Houckgeest. Designed for Mrs. Washington by van Braam himself, the service celebrated the nascent United States of America through the decorative motif repeated on each piece. Today, fewer than 20 pieces of the remarkable service remain.
Call for Nominations | SAH Publication Awards, 2017
From H-ArtHist:
The Society of Architectural Historians Publication Awards
Nominations due by 1 August 2016
The Society of Architectural Historians is accepting nominations for its 2017 Publication Awards. The program includes five awards that will be presented at the Society’s 2017 Annual International Conference (Glasgow, June 7–11). The deadline to submit is Monday, August 1, 2016.
• Alice Davis Hitchcock Book Award Presented for distinguished scholarship by a North American author in the history of architecture
• Philip Johnson Exhibition Catalogue Award Presented for excellence in published exhibition catalogues
• Antoinette Forrester Downing Book Award Presented for an outstanding publication devoted to historical issues in the preservation field
• Elisabeth Blair MacDougall Book Award Presented for distinguished scholarship in the history of landscape architecture or garden design
• Spiro Kostof Book Award Presented for work that focuses on urbanism and architecture and provides the greatest contribution to our understanding of historical development and change
Learn more and download a nomination form at the SAH website.
Exhibition | Emperors’ Treasures: Chinese Art from Taipei
Press release (2 May 2016) from the Asian Art Museum:
Emperors’ Treasures: Chinese Art from the National Palace Museum, Taipei
Asian Art Museum, San Francisco, 17 June — 18 September 2016
Museum of Fine Arts, Houston 23 October 2016 — 22 January 2017
Curated by Jay Xu and Li He
The centerpiece of the Asian Art Museum’s 50th anniversary year, Emperors’ Treasures: Chinese Art from the National Palace Museum, Taipei, presents nearly 150 imperial masterworks, many of which are making their North American debut. Visitors will discover a trove of exquisite paintings, ceramics, jades and more from one of the world’s greatest collections of Chinese art. The exhibition offers audiences a chance to behold the prized possessions of eight emperors and an empress, passed from dynasty to dynasty and once sheltered in Beijing’s Forbidden City. A glimpse into the artistic life inside an imperial palace, the exhibition showcases how family collections were refined over generations, showcasing rare pieces created by emperors themselves in private moments of inspiration.
Leng Mei, Illustrations of Farming and Weaving, ca. 1696; Qing dynasty (1644–1911), reign of Emperor Kangxi (1662–1722). Album leaves, colors on silk (Taipei: National Palace Museum)
“This is the absolute ‘best of the best’ of Chinese imperial art,” says Jay Xu, director of the Asian Art Museum. “By exploring how artistic taste was cultivated and evaluated—which created standards of beauty and elegance across Chinese culture—the exhibition reflects the museum’s mission of connecting audiences today with the great arts and traditions of Asia.”
The meticulously crafted public identities and carefully guarded private lives of each ruler will be told in a story narrated by the artworks of their eras, from the dignified Song to the bold yet subtle Yuan, from the celebrated brilliance of the Ming to the last days of the dazzling Qing dynasty.
While the National Palace Museum, Taipei, is renowned among Chinese art enthusiasts, historically its collection has not been widely accessible to the American public. Displays have traveled to the U.S. only a handful of times: in the 1960s and again in 1995–1996 for an exhibition presented by both The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the Asian Art Museum—an exhibition that Xu also participated in organizing during his time as a junior research fellow there. “It’s exactly 20 years later,” Xu notes. “However, there are many works that haven’t been seen outside Asia before. In terms of the objects and time periods, it’s a fresh perspective for American audiences since the imperial court surrounded itself with the most important, avant-garde works of its time.”
Imperial Workshop, Beijing, Hibiscus-shaped bowl; Qing dynasty, reign of Emperor Yongzheng (1723–1735). Agate (Taipei: National Palace Museum)
Organized around the lives of nine rulers—eight emperors and one empress who reigned from the early 12th through the early 20th centuries—the exhibition will explore how taste and connoisseurship as both personal virtues and statements of political power evolved over 800 years. By examining the distinct contributions of each subject, the rich styles and the variety of craftsmanship they prized, the exhibition outlines how Chinese art developed and flourished under Han Chinese, Mongol and later Manchu regimes. Through this exceptional selection of objects, Emperors’ Treasures presents a unique occasion for audiences to connect with powerful historical figures through their most cherished belongings, relating to them on an intimate, human scale that only art can express.
Emperors’ Treasures unfolds chronologically, allowing audiences to gauge how imperial tastes evolved from within China or due to external pressures, looking backward to ancient examples or blazing forward with new ideas. The exhibition flows through four galleries on the museum’s first floor.
Vase with revolving core and eight-trigram design, ca. 1744. Jingdezhen, Jiangxi province, Qing dynasty, reign of Emperor Qianlong (1736–1795). Porcelain with golden glaze, multicolor decoration, and appliquéd sculpture. (Taipei: National Palace Museum)
Opening in the large Osher Gallery, audiences are introduced to the Song emperors (960–1279), celebrated for leading a renaissance in Chinese art more than 800 years ago. Here, visitors will discover the masterful landscapes and calligraphy of Emperor Huizong, recognized for his distinctive, influential ‘slender-gold’ script. Alongside these elegant works are the robust art pieces and an imposing portrait demanded by the mighty Yuan-dynasty (1271–1368) ruler Kublai Khan. Also in this gallery are legendary Ming porcelains (1368–1644), the pinnacle of ceramic art in China. Highlights include a rare cloisonné vessel; one of only two surviving blue-and-white Ming vases depicting West Asian entertainers; and the ‘holy grail’ of Chinese porcelains—a wine cup with a cock and hen design like the example recently sold at Sotheby’s for more than $36 million.
The adjacent Hambrecht Gallery features an overview of illustrious Qing-dynasty accomplishments (1644–1911). During this period, a dozen imperial workshops across the Chinese Empire were opened to fulfill the Forbidden City’s relentless appetite for lacquers, enamels and carved jade, like the paper-thin hibiscus-shaped bowl from the early 1700s, sculpted from a single piece of glowing, nut-brown agate.
Next door is the Lee Gallery, which paints an intimate portrait of the 18th-century Qianlong Emperor, known as the ‘Old Man of Ten Perfections’ and admired as the most prolific poet-monarch in Chinese history. Through a selection of paintings, carvings and other treasures, audiences will see how a single ruler caused a seismic shift in the creative output of China. While many of the masterworks remain quietly breathtaking in their elegance, others certainly call out to the interests of today. The White Falcon hanging scroll by Italian Jesuit Giuseppe Castiglione introduces visitors to an intriguing European figure who spent decades in the Qing court, serving under Emperors Kangxi, Yongzheng, and Qianlong. Having his Chinese name as Lang Shining, Castiglione’s collaboration on court portraits and paintings underscores a tradition of East-West cultural exchange that continues in the current globalized art arena.
Lang Shining (Giuseppe Castiglione, Italian, 1688–1766), White Falcon; Qing dynasty, reign of the Qianlong emperor (1736–1795). Hanging scroll, colors on silk (Taipei: National Palace Museum)
The exhibition concludes in the museum’s Resource Room with a focus on the Empress Dowager Cixi, a Manchu concubine who rose to become the long-ruling power behind the final Qing emperors. Cixi recruited female artists to her ‘Studio of Great Elegance’, where, under her personal direction, the coterie combined traditional symbols and patterns with botanical study, setting a foundation for modern Chinese aesthetics.
An icon of the National Palace Museum, Taipei, the celebrated Qing-dynasty ‘Meat-shaped stone’ will also be traveling to the U.S. for the first time. The stone—a hunk of jasper carved and dyed to resemble a portion of braised pork belly fresh from the pot—exemplifies how the enduring appeal of traditional Chinese cooking has long inspired devotion. When on view in Japan in 2014, the stone was seen by an average of 6,000 people a day and generated a mini-boom in dongpo rou, the classic dish it closely resembles. In honor of the stone’s unusual appeal, a special edition of the Asian Art Museum’s popular Thursday evening programs will feature innovative new dishes inspired by the Meat-shaped stone and prepared by four local chefs. Their dishes—from street carts to haute cuisine—will be presented to the public on July 7. Additionally, from June 17 to July 18, more than a dozen San Francisco chefs, both up-and-coming and established, will feature versions of the mouthwatering, slow-simmered ‘priceless pork belly’ in their restaurants. Another take on the delicious dish developed by Melinda Quirino, chef at the museum’s own Cafe Asia, will be available for visitors to enjoy throughout the exhibition’s run.
Meat-shaped stone; Qing dynasty (1644–1911). Jasper, golden stand (Taipei: National Palace Museum)
“Emperors’ Treasures is about looking forward and starting the museum’s next 50 years on the right note,” says Xu. “We not only share and present exceptional works of art, but we help people understand their context, significance and relevance.”
Emperors’ Treasures was made possible by a generous grant from Presenting Sponsor, The Robert H. N. Ho Family Foundation. “This important support from The Robert H. N. Ho Family Foundation enables the Asian Art Museum to curate and present Emperors’ Treasures, which will expose a global audience to the beauty and depth of Chinese art and culture,” said Xu.
Ted Lipman, CEO of The Robert H. N. Ho Family Foundation, noted: “This exhibition marks the third collaboration between the Asian Art Museum and The Robert H. N. Ho Family Foundation. A key mission of the Foundation is to promote Chinese culture and the arts to Western audiences to increase understanding and appreciation of this ancient legacy. Nowhere does the 5,000 years of Chinese history manifest itself more beautifully and comprehensively than the exquisite imperial collection, which has been lovingly conserved and displayed at the National Palace Museum, Taipei. Through support for this significant exhibition, the Foundation seeks to provide visitors with an unprecedented opportunity to witness China’s vibrant cultural heritage first-hand.”
Emperors’ Treasures: Chinese Art from the National Palace Museum, Taipei is co-organized by the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco and the National Palace Museum, Taipei. The exhibition is curated by Asian Art Museum Director Jay Xu and Li He, associate curator of Chinese art.
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Jay Xu and He Li, eds., Emperors’ Treasures: Chinese Art from the National Palace Museum, Taipei (San Francisco, Asian Art Museum, 2016), 272 pages, ISBN: 978-0939117734, $50.
Emperors’ Treasures features artworks from the renowned National Palace Museum, Taipei. It encompasses paintings, calligraphy, bronzes, ceramics, lacquer ware, jades, and textiles exemplifying the finest craftsmanship and imperial taste. The exhibition catalog explores the identities of eight Chinese rulers—seven emperors and one empress—who reigned from the early 12th through early 20th centuries. They are portrayed in a story line that highlights artworks of their eras, from the dignified Song to the coarse yet subtle Yuan, and from the brilliant Ming until the final, dazzling Qing period. Emperors’ Treasures examines each ruler’s distinct contribution to the arts and how each developed his or her aesthetic and connoisseurship.
With contributions by Fung Ming-chu, Jay Xu, Ho Chuan-hsin, Alfreda Murck, Tianlong Jiao, Li He, and curators from the National Palace Museum and the Asian Art Museum.
Jay Xu is Executive Director of the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco. He is the first Chinese American director at a major US art museum and the first Asian American museum director elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Li He is associate curator of Chinese Art at the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco and a visiting research fellow at the Palace Museum, Beijing. She is the author of Chinese Ceramics: A New Comprehensive History from the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco.
Conference | Staging the Holy
From H-ArtHist:
Internationaler Barocksommerkurs: Die Inszenierung des Heiligen
Bibliothek Werner Oechslin, Einsiedeln, Switzerland, 26–30 June 2016
Registration due by 24 June 2016
Mit Unterstützung der Schweizerischen Akademie der Geistes- und Sozialwissenschaften und des Schweizerischen Nationalfonds. Die Veranstaltung ist öffentlich. Gasthörer sind herzlich willkommen. Aus organisatorischen Gründen bitten wir um Anmeldung an: info@bibliothek-oechslin.ch.
S U N D A Y , 2 6 J U N E 2 0 1 6
I. Göttliches / Heiliges: Sakramente und Hostie
9.15 Round Table: Einführung mit Axel Christoph Gampp, Stefan Kummer, Werner Oechslin, Tristan Weddigen
9.50 Piet Lombaerde (Universität Antwerpen), Statues of the saints as mirrors of divine light in Jesuit Baroque architecture in the Southern Netherlands
10.30 Kaffeepause
11.00 Evangelia Papoulia (University of London), Pope Gregory XIII’s Staging of the Sacraments in the Lateran
11.40 Helen Boessenecker (Universität Bonn), Heiligenstatuen und “early christian revival”. Zur (Re-)Inszenierung des Heiligen in der römischen Altarskulptur um 1600
12.20 Reinhard Gruhl (Universität Hamburg), Frühneuzeitlich-calvinistische Kultanalyse und Kultkritik in Rivets großem Exodus-Kommentar
13.00 Mittagspause
14.30 Steffen Zierholz (Universität Bern), Bild und Rahmen. Zu Berninis Hauptaltar in Sant’Andrea al Quirinale in Rom
15.10 Tobias Glitsch (RWTH Aachen), Die Sakralisierung des Messgeschehens im Altarraum von S. Andrea al Quirinale
15.50 Kaffeepause
16.20 Mirjam Brandt (Universität Bonn), Gloriosa Antiquitas – Zur Wertschätzung mittelalterlicher vasa sacra im 17. und 18. Jahrhundert
17.00 Mateusz Kapustka (Universität Zürich), Barocke Bildgeometrie der Hostie?
18.30 Gemeinsames Abendessen
M O N D A Y , 2 7 J U N E 2 0 1 6
II. Apparate / Maschinen / Theater
9.00 Johannes Gebhardt (Universität Leipzig/Biblioteca Hertziana Rom), Apparitio Sacri – Occultatio Operis: Zeigen und Verbergen von Kultbildern im Italien des 17. Jahrhunderts
9.40 Ria Fabri (Universität Antwerpen), Staging the sacred: Mechanical systems and a hidden theatre in the Antwerp Jesuit church
10.20 Kaffeepause
10.50 Noria K. Litaker (University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia), From Bits to Bodies: The Construction and Presentation of Whole-Body Catacomb Saints in Baroque Bavaria
11.30 Jens Niebaum (Universität Münster), “Plus Ultra”: Figuration des Heiligen an der Fassade der Wiener Karlskirche
12.10 Léon Lock (Leuven), Renewing devotional practices in Antwerp in the late 17th century: The role of sculpted saints
13.00 Mittagspause
14.30 Verena Villiger (Museum für Kunst und Geschichte Freiburg), Arbeit an der Inszenierung: Der Maler Hans Fries entwickelt ein Marienbild (um 1504/05)
15.10 Nina Niedermeier (Universität München), Filippo Neri umarmt Ignatius von Loyola – die strahlende Seele als Zeichen von Heiligkeit
15.50 Kaffeepause
16.20 Susanne Lang (Darmstadt), “also reden die Altär und Bildnussen” vom Sterben des Hl. Franz Xaver – zum Beispiel in Rastatt
17.00 Sabrina Leps (Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden), Die Inszenierung des Heiligen Franz Xaver in der protestantischen Diaspora
17.50 Führung durch die Bibliothek
19.00 Gemeinsames Abendessen
T U E S D A Y , 2 8 J U N E 2 0 1 6
Day-long excursions to Hergiswald, Blatten, Lucerne, Sachseln, Beckenried, and Gersau
W E D N E S D A Y , 2 9 J U N E 2 0 1 6
III. Das Innen und Aussen des Heiligen
9.30 Lorenzo Santoro (Università della Calabria, Arcavacata), Giovanni Battista Guadagnini’s Critique of Via Crucis: The Question of the Station of the Cross Ritual in the Italian Late Enlightenment
10.10 Matija Jerkovic (Pontificia Università Gregoriana, Rom), Sacred Art and Its Liturgical Staging: Reliquary Bust of Saint Stephen of Hungary
10.50 Kaffeepause
11.20 Stephan Boll (Universität Stuttgart), Santa Rosalia von Palermo: Die Inszenierung einer neuen „alten“ Heiligen im Barock
12.00 Marek Pučalík (Karlsuniversität Prag), “Catholische Vergötterung des Heiligen Johann von Nepomuck“: Eine unbekannte Beschreibung der Triumphpforten zur Feier der Kanonisation des hl. Johann Nepomuk in Prag (1730)
13.00 Mittagspause
14.30 Barbara Lawatsch-Melton (Emory University, Atlanta), Celebrating Sanctity at Nonnenberg Abbey (1622–1682): Observing and Transcending Boundaries
15.10 Claire Guinomet (Humboldt-Forum Berlin), Die Inszenierung des Heiligen am Beispiel des Tempietto-Tabernakels im 16. und 17. Jahrhundert
15.50 Kaffeepause
16.20 Peter Heinrich Jahn (TU Dresden), Evozierte Sakralität in profanem Kontext – Inszenierungen der polnischen Königswürde in den Dresdner Residenzschlossplanungen des Matthäus Daniel Pöppelmann
17.00 Virgil Pop (Universitatea Tehnica din Cluj-Napoca), The Restorations of Medieval Churches in Transylvania in the Age of Baroque
T H U R S D A Y , 3 0 J U N E 2 0 1 6
IV. Orte und Wege
9.30 Thomas Wilke (Stuttgart), Das Turiner Grabtuch – die „Staatsreliquie“ der Savoyer
10.10 Silvia Tammaro (Universität Wien), Die Edicola del Santissimo Sacramento von Turin und ihre Darstellung im Theatrum Sabaudiae
10.50 Kaffeepause
11.20 Madleine Skarda (Universität Zürich), “Heiliger Weeg von Prag nach Alt-Bunzlau”: Die Nischenkapellen auf dem Weg zur Martyrienstätte des Heiligen Wenzelsplatz in Stará Boleslav
12.00 Kerstin Borchhardt (Universität Leipzig), Die göttliche Kausalität der Radiolarien-Ikonen: Ernst Haeckels Ästhetik und Inszenierung seiner monistischen Weltformel
13.00 Mittagspause
14.30 Stephan Wyss (Marly FR), Die Inszenierung des Heiligen in umgekehrter Perspektive. – Kunst und Theologie, Pavel Florenskij und Martin Buber
15.10 Joris van Gastel (Bibliotheca Hertziana Rom), Dressing Up the Holy: Stoffwechsel and Ephemerality in Baroque Naples
15.50 Kaffeepause
16.20 Jürgen Müller (TU Dresden), Caravaggio und das Heilige
17.00 Werner Oechslin (Stiftung Bibliothek Werner Oechslin, Einsiedeln), Afterthought: „die historische Construction des Christenthums“
18.30 Abschiedsabendessen
Exhibition | The English Rose: Feminine Beauty
Now on view at The Bowes Museum:
The English Rose: Feminine Beauty from Van Dyck to Sargent
The Bowes Museum, Barnard Castle, County Durham, 14 May — 25 September 2016
Anthony van Dyck, Portrait of Olivia Porter, ca. 1637 (The Bowes Museum)
The catalyst for The English Rose: Feminine Beauty from Van Dyck to Sargent—a salute to 400 years of society beauties—is a portrait recently acquired by The Bowes Museum via Arts Council England, in lieu of inheritance tax from the estate of the Duke of Northumberland. Olivia, Mrs. Endymion Porter, by court painter Van Dyck, was painted ca. 1637, when the artist was at the height of his career. One of his finest female portraits, it depicts Mrs. Porter, a lady-in-waiting to Queen Henrietta Maria—whose portrait also features in the show—in shift and pearls, displaying the ‘careless romance’ that is evident in many of Van Dyck’s images. Whilst this is an intimate domestic portrait commissioned by her husband, it also demonstrates his wealth, status, and prestige by the fact that he could afford to engage the King’s painter.
The exhibition’s themes centre on the artists represented, their sitters, and fashions and will follow a chronological order from the 17th to the 20th century. Alongside The Bowes Museum’s two Van Dyck’s will feature paintings by Gainsborough, Reynolds, George Romney, John Singer Sargent, and Peter Lely, loaned from galleries around the UK including the National Gallery, the V&A Museum, Dulwich Picture Gallery, The Holburne Museum, and the National Galleries of Scotland.
Thomas Gainsborough, Portrait of Elizabeth and Mary Linley, ca.1772, retouched 1785 (Dulwich Picture Gallery)
Many of the sitters are as famous as those engaged to paint them. Mrs. Sarah Siddons, the outstanding ‘tragic’ actress of her time, most famous for her dramatic portrayal of Lady Macbeth, reportedly had Gainsborough experiencing difficulties with her nose, leading him to exclaim, “Confound the nose, there’s no end to it.”
Fascinating beauties Elizabeth and Mary Linley, part of the famous 18th-century musical family known as ‘The Nest of the Nightingales’, also sat for Gainsborough, in the only known painting depicting both sisters together. The former had a colourful life: betrothed to a man of her father’s choice, a duel was fought between him and a then penniless Richard Brinsley Sheridan, soon to become a leading playwright, with Sheridan eventually winning her hand. Although the sisters’ extraordinary talents saw them perform privately for royalty and publicly at Covent Garden, both were forbidden to sing in public after marriage.
While female artists were thin on the ground in the 17th century, Mary Beale is represented in a self-portrait, ca. 1675—not unusual in those days, as there were few models to sit for them. Holding an artist’s palette, she is depicted as determined to challenge society’s intended role for her.
Adrian Jenkins, Director of The Bowes Museum, said: “We are delighted to celebrate the gift of this wonderful Van Dyck portrait, which will be central to our forthcoming exhibition. We also thank the Arts Council for their decision to retain this important painting in the North of England, where it will enhance The Bowes Museum’s permanent collection.”
Programming information is available here»
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