Enfilade

Now on view at the Rijksmuseum:

Bad-boy Adrian Beverland / Hadriaan Beverland
Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, 26 April — 17 September 2018

Isaak Beckett, after Simon Dubois, Portrait of Adrian Beverland Drawing a Statue of Venus, ca. 1685–90 (Amsterdam: Rijksmuseum).

On display in Gallery 2.21 is a small exhibition of the work of 17th-century bad-boy Adrian Beverland (1650–1716), a Dutch classicist who devoted his studies exclusively to one subject: sex! The display in this gallery of a selection of fourteen portraits, publications, and erotic prints from Beverland’s collection offers a tantalising glimpse into his intriguing life and his predilection for erotica.

For many years, Beverland worked on an encyclopaedia of eroticism in the ancient world entitled De Prostibulis Veterum (On the Prostitution of the Classics). But it was never published. When another provocative treatise by Beverland appeared in print in 1679, he was banished from the Dutch provinces of Holland, Zeeland and West-Friesland. His reputation as a scholar lay in ruins.

The disgraced classicist moved to London, where he built up a new life, earning a respectable living as an agent in art and literature and hunting out interesting antiquities, shells, and manuscripts for wealthy collectors. But the delights of erotica still beckoned, and Beverland continued his studies in secret. He illustrated his notes with intriguing, erotic collages comprising cut-out fragments of prints, and he was apparently unable to restrain himself from referring to his bad-boy status in curious portraits of himself. In one we see a mischievous Beverland drawing the bare buttocks of a statue of Venus.

Those wishing to find out more about Adrian Beverland will be interested to know that Joyce Zelen, an Andrew W. Mellon Fellow, is currently studying the life of this ostracised eroticist. Her research into Beverland’s portraits will be published in the Rijksmuseum Bulletin later this year, and the complete results of her broader study of Beverland will appear in a year’s time.

Jean-Étienne Liotard, Portrait of Maria Frederike van Reede-Athlone at Seven Years of Age (detail), 1755–56, pastel on vellum
(Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum)

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Now on view at The Getty Center:

Eighteenth-Century Pastel Portraits
J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, 28 August — 13 October 2018

Pastels—dry, satiny colors, manufactured in sticks of every hue—enjoyed a surge in popularity during the eighteenth century, becoming, for a time, the medium of choice for European portraiture. This display of pastels from the permanent collection explores the specific physical properties that made this medium so appealing to eighteenth-century portraitists and their patrons.

Now on view at The British Museum:

What is Europe? Views from Asia
The British Museum, London, 23 August — 22 October 2018

Painted wooden Hentakoi board, Nicobar Islands, around 1800–1900.

Exploring the interconnected relationships between Asia and Europe from the 18th century to the mid-20th century, the exhibition What is Europe? Views from Asia looks at Europe from the outside. Examining perceptions of Europe through a series of objects from Japan, China and South Asia, this display illustrates how encounters between Asia and Europe are often far more nuanced than has been previously presented. The exhibition includes a wide variety of objects that challenge common preconceptions—from prints, magazines, and paintings to sculptures and protective figures.

Two objects from the Nicobar Islands in the Indian Ocean shed light on the complex artistic response to European trade and power relations. The Islands were colonised by Denmark in 1756, and then sold to Britain in 1869, and are now a union territory of India. A Nicobarese hentakoi (painted board) shows the selective adoption of European practices and goods and the importance of local objects deemed valuable and symbolic. Hentakoi were thought to have protective powers, and this example shows a European ship, a local vessel and a Chinese boat, as well as a deity flanked by a compass and chronometer. A kareau (protective figure) from the Nicobar Islands is also included in the display—portrayed wearing a European pith helmet.

Subtle examples of subversion and dissent are also on display, such as the reception of European religions in Asia—a porcelain figure of the bodhisattva Guanyin and child shows this relationship. Made for hundreds of years for Buddhist devotion in China and Japan, in the 18th century some manufacturers added Christian imagery to these statues in the form of a mantilla—a Christian head-covering. Christianity was forbidden in Japan from 1587 to 1859, so sculptures like this, made for European export markets, allowed ‘hidden’ Christians to worship in secret in Japan.

The ridicule and mocking of Europe is also represented in the exhibition. A 1943 manga magazine mocks Allied wartime leader Winston Churchill, and an earlier print made during the Russo-Japanese war of 1904–05 ridicules the Russian Navy, describing them as ‘aimless boats’.

The display contains examples of the multi-faceted relationship and mutual adoption of Asian and European artistic styles. Instances of Western influence on Asian artists are shown alongside Chinese porcelain made for export to markets in Europe. There are also links between individual artists in the exhibition—German printmaker Käthe Kollwitz and Chinese artist Li Hua.

Together, the objects in this display reveal the nuanced and complex relationships between Asian and European nations from the 1700s to the mid-1900s, presenting narratives from many different backgrounds and encouraging debate about the present.