Exhibition and Blog | Mended Ways: The Art of Inventive Repair
The exhibition closed last weekend, but anyone interested in the topic should have a look at Andrew Baseman’s blog Past Imperfect: The Art of Inventive Repair.
Mended Ways: The Art of Inventive Repair from the Collection of Andrew Baseman
The New York Ceramics and Glass Fair, 21–24 January 2016
Before the invention of Krazy Glue, broken household items were brought back to life with flair and ingenuity. Mended Ways: The Art of Inventive Repair takes you back to a time when necessity was truly the mother of invention, as seen in Andrew Baseman’s collection of over 500 examples of 17th- to mid 20th-century mended ceramics and glassware.
A variety of early repair techniques shown will include metal staple/rivets, perfected in China by itinerant ‘china menders’; tinkers’ replaced handles, lids, and spouts on mugs, teapots and jugs; intricate and detailed silversmiths’ repairs, which only the wealthy could afford.
Extraordinary pieces include a 17th-century Dutch delft ewer with a replaced jeweled metal spout and handle; an American blown and cut crystal candlestick from the early 1900s incongruously stuck into a block of wood; a c. 1850 English lustreware creamer with tin straps and handle; and a set of six delicately painted early 18th-century Chinese export plates held together with enough hand forged metal staples to keep Frankenstein’s monster intact.
Other fascinating repairs include a Chinese Yixing teapot, c. 1700, with a magnificently carved replacement handle and engraved silver mounts; an 1830s transfer-printed jug from England with woven wicker handle; and an 18th-century Chinese export teapot with a record number of repairs including a sterling silver spout, metal rivets supporting the handle, and a replaced hand-painted lid with chain attached to handle. To illustrate what some of the pieces looked like before they took a tumble, intact examples will be shown for a side-by-side comparison.
Andrew Baseman writes the blog, Past Imperfect: The Art of Inventive Repair, which chronicles Baseman’s world-renowned collection of antique ceramics with inventive repairs, also known as ‘make-do’s’. His collection was featured in a cover story for the Home & Garden section of The New York Times. He is an expert on the subject and has lectured in the US and abroad. His lifelong passion for collecting and selling antiques began at an early age and continues to inspire his design work today.
For over 20 years, Baseman worked as a designer, decorator and stylist on diverse film and television projects including The Nanny Diaries, Eat, Pray, Love, The Americans, Gotham and The Normal Heart, working with notable directors Ryan Murphy, Bill Condon, Jane Campion, and others. In 2003, he founded Andrew Baseman Design, Inc., an interior design firm specializing in upscale residential interiors, creating luxurious homes for clients in the visual arts, including film and theatrical producers, fashion designers, and others. He is the author of The Scarf (Stewart, Tabori & Chang, 1989), the classic illustrated art book chronicling the history of the printed scarf that reflects both his expertise and love of textiles.
New Book | Histories of Ornament: From Global to Local
From Princeton UP:
Gülru Necipoğlu & Alina Payne, eds., Histories of Ornament: From Global to Local (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2016), 464 pages, ISBN: 978-0691167282, $60 / £42.
This lavishly illustrated volume is the first major global history of ornament from the Middle Ages to today. Crossing historical and geographical boundaries in unprecedented ways and considering the role of ornament in both art and architecture, Histories of Ornament offers a nuanced examination that integrates medieval, Renaissance, baroque, and modern Euroamerican traditions with their Islamic, Indian, Chinese, and Mesoamerican counterparts. At a time when ornament has re-emerged in architectural practice and is a topic of growing interest to art and architectural historians, the book reveals how the long history of ornament illuminates its global resurgence today.
Organized by thematic sections on the significance, influence, and role of ornament, the book addresses ornament’s current revival in architecture, its historiography and theories, its transcontinental mobility in medieval and early modern Europe and the Middle East, and its place in the context of industrialization and modernism. Throughout, Histories of Ornament emphasizes the portability and politics of ornament, figuration versus abstraction, cross-cultural dialogues, and the constant negotiation of local and global traditions.
Featuring original essays by more than two dozen scholars from around the world, this authoritative and wide-ranging book provides an indispensable reference on the histories of ornament in a global context. Contributors include: Michele Bacci (Fribourg University); Anna Contadini (University of London); Thomas B. F. Cummins (Harvard); Chanchal Dadlani (Wake Forest); Daniela del Pesco (Universita degli Studi Roma Tre); Vittoria Di Palma (USC); Anne Dunlop (University of Melbourne); Marzia Faietti (University of Bologna); María Judith Feliciano (independent scholar); Finbarr Barry Flood (NYU); Jonathan Hay (NYU); Christopher P. Heuer (Clark Art); Rémi Labrusse (Université Paris Ouest Nanterre la Défense); Gülru Necipoğlu (Harvard); Marco Rosario Nobile (University of Palermo); Oya Pancaroğlu (Bosphorus University); Spyros Papapetros (Princeton); Alina Payne (Harvard); Antoine Picon (Harvard); David Pullins (Harvard); Jennifer L. Roberts (Harvard); David J. Roxburgh (Harvard); Hashim Sarkis (MIT); Robin Schuldenfrei (Courtauld); Avinoam Shalem (Columbia); and Gerhard Wolf (KHI, Florence).
Gülru Necipoglu is the Aga Khan Professor of Islamic Art and director of the Aga Khan Program for Islamic Architecture at Harvard University. She is the author of The Age of Sinan: Architectural Culture in the Ottoman Empire (Princeton) and The Topkapi Scroll: Geometry and Ornament in Islamic Architecture. Alina Payne is the Alexander P. Misheff Professor of History of Art and Architecture at Harvard University and Paul E. Geier Director of Villa I Tatti, The Harvard Center for Italian Renaissance Studies at Villa I Tatti in Florence. She is the author of The Architectural Treatise in the Italian Renaissance and From Ornament to Object: Genealogies of Architectural Modernism.
Exhibition | Hubert Robert, 1733–1808
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From the National Gallery of Art:
Hubert Robert (1733–1808), un peintre visionnaire
Musée du Louvre, Paris, 7 March — 30 May 2016
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 6 June — 2 October 2016
Known fondly as ‘Robert des ruines’ because of his penchant for painting ancient ruins, Hubert Robert was regarded during his lifetime as one of France’s most successful and prominent artists. In the first monographic exhibition showcasing Robert’s full achievement as a draftsman and painter, some 50 paintings and 50 drawings will chart his development in Rome and subsequent high level of accomplishment after his return to Paris. The exhibition will also focus on Robert’s lasting contribution to French visual culture and the fundamental role he played in promoting the architectural capriccio (caprice or fantasy), an art form in which famous monuments of antiquity and modernity were imaginatively combined to create striking and novel city scenes and landscapes.
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The English edition catalogue is published by Lund Humphries:
Margaret Morgan Grasselli with contributions from Yuriko Jackall, Guillaume Faroult and Catherine Voiriot, Hubert Robert (London: Lund Humphries, 2016), 288 pages, ISBN: 978-1848221918, £45.
Known fondly as ‘Robert des ruines’ because of his penchant for painting ancient ruins, Hubert Robert (1733–1808) was one of France’s most successful and prominent artists during his lifetime. This outstanding publication, which accompanies the first monographic exhibition of his work, illuminates Robert’s remarkable artistic achievements and his lasting contributions to French visual culture.
Robert’s skills were manifold—he enjoyed great success as a painter, draftsman, interior decorator and garden architect. During his time in Rome, he fostered close professional bonds with artists such as Piranesi, Panini and Fragonard, while in Paris he flourished under the patronage of several wealthy French supporters including the Marquis de Marigny, brother of the famed Madame de Pompadour. Robert’s work later addressed the demise of this glittering society through both ominous scenes of disaster and representations of vandalized royalist monuments. Upon his own release from imprisonment following the French Revolution, Robert completed a series of meditative variations on the Grande Galerie of the Musée du Louvre, of which he had been appointed curator in 1784.
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The French edition catalogue is published by Somogy:
Guillaume Faroult, ed., Hubert Robert (1733–1808) : un peintre visionnaire (Paris: Somogy, 2016), 544 pages, ISBN: 978-2757210642, 49€.
Hubert Robert fut l’un des créateurs les plus séduisants du siècle des Lumières. Artisan de cet art de vivre poli, galant et souriant qui paraît l’une des quintessences de l’esprit français au XVIIIe siècle, l’artiste attire d’emblée la sympathie. Il parvint à s’introduire dans les cercles les plus brillants de son temps, édifiant une carrière exemplaire dans la France de l’Ancien Régime jusqu’au règne de Napoléon.
Formé à Rome vers le milieu du siècle, en pleine fièvre antiquaire, Robert s’impose dès son retour à Paris comme « peintre d’architecture ». Le philosophe Denis Diderot célèbre aussitôt la «poétique des ruines » du jeune artiste. La production de Robert fait preuve au cours de sa carrière d’une exceptionnelle dynamique d’amplification: les œuvres, les projets, les charges y atteignent une dimension considérable. L’artiste devient très recherché pour la production de vastes ensembles de décors peints. Il se lance enfin avec succès dans une forme d’« art total » en tant que créateur de jardins, dont le parc de Méréville (de 1786 à 1793) fut sans doute le chef-d’œuvre.
Frappé par le bouleversement historique de la Révolution française, il en consigne les premières manifestations en représentant, dès l’été 1789, La Bastille dans les premiers jours de sa démolition. En 1795, il réintègre sa fonction de conservateur du «Muséum national », c’est-à-dire du musée du Louvre qui vient d’ouvrir ses portes, et dont il avait préparé activement la création. Sans aucun doute, l’œuvre de Robert est parcourue par un sens de l’écoulement inexorable du temps et, par-delà, par une conscience de la marche de l’histoire, tour à tour triomphante ou déplorable, qui en constitue l’impressionnante grandeur.
Exhibition | Mavericks: Breaking the Mould of British Architecture
William Hodges and William Pars, The Pantheon, Oxford Street, London, 1770–72, by James Wyatt, oil on canvas (Leeds Museums and Art Galleries / Temple Newsam House)
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Press release (8 December 2015) from the RA:
Mavericks: Breaking the Mould of British Architecture
Royal Academy of Arts, London, 26 January – 20 April 2016
Curated by Owen Hopkins
Mavericks: Breaking the Mould of British Architecture is an installation that will chart the course of British architecture from the sixteenth century to the present day through the work of twelve maverick architects: Robert Smythson, Sir John Vanbrugh, James Wyatt PRA, Sir John Soane RA, Charles Robert Cockerell RA, Charles Rennie Mackintosh, Charles Holden, H. S. Goodhart-Rendel, James Stirling RA, Cedric Price, FAT and Zaha Hadid RA.
Each of the twelve mavericks has charted his or her own course, often deliberately ignoring prevailing taste, fashion and ways of working. The installation comprises of images and photographs of these maverick architects’ work, situating their work within the broader context of architectural history, through an arresting colour-gradated design by Scott-Whitby Studio. Celebrating the original and the unorthodox, the installation will pose an intriguing alternative narrative to the history of British architecture.
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Owen Hopkins, Mavericks: Breaking the Mould of British Architecture (London: Royal Academy Publications, 2016), 128 pages, ISBN: 978-1910350393, £13 / $28.
The history of architecture is a story of continual innovation, and at certain points within that story come architects whose visions completely defy convention. Mavericks focuses on 12 such figures from the history of British architecture, including Sir John Soane, Charles Rennie Mackintosh, Cedric Price, and Zaha Hadid. From the stripped-back classicism of Soane’s Dulwich Picture Gallery to Hadid’s neofuturistic London Aquatics Centre for the 2012 Olympics, the architects’ work is bold, frequently controversial, and often radical. It is architecture that actively resists being pigeonholed into a particular style or period. What connects this naturally disparate group of free creative spirits is the way each has charted his or her own course, often deliberately evading conventions of taste, fashion, and ways of working. This book offers a fresh take on their creations, establishing new and sometimes surprising historical connections while proposing an intriguing alternative narrative to the history of British architecture.
Owen Hopkins is Architecture Programme Curator at the Royal Academy of Arts, London, and has written widely on architecture for The Burlington Magazine, The Architectural Review, Apollo, Dezeen, RA Magazine, C20 Magazine, The Oxonian Review, Architects’ Journal and Building Design. He is author of Reading Architecture: A Visual Lexicon (Laurence King, 2012), Architectural Styles: A Visual Guide (Laurence King, 2014) and From the Shadows: The Architecture and Afterlife of Nicholas Hawksmoor (Reaktion, 2015).
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E V E N T S
All events take place at the Geological Society, Piccadilly; £12 / reductions £6
Does Architecture Need Mavericks?
Thursday 4 February, 6.30–8pm
Owen Hopkins introduces the Mavericks book and installation and chairs a debate exploring the role of unorthodox approaches and original thinking in architecture.
Maverick Architects – A Thing of the Past?
Thursday 25 February, 6.30–8pm
Faced with the crushing weight of student debt and an increasingly risk-averse building industry, the panel explore if there is any future for mavericks in architecture.
After the Age of ‘Starchitects’
Monday, 7 March, 6.30–8pm
What might life be like after the signature-style, icon-obsessed—and male-dominated—age of the ‘starchitect’? The panel explores.
The Artist as Maverick Architect
Monday, 21 March, 6.30–8pm
Sean Griffiths, co-founder of FAT, one of the architects featured in Mavericks, chairs this discussion exploring the different perspectives artists can bring to the making of architecture.
Britain’s Greatest Maverick Building – The Debate
Monday, 18 April, 6.30–8pm
Do you have a favourite quirky or unusual building? Let us know on Twitter for a chance for it to be included in this debate looking for Britain’s greatest maverick building: @architecture_RA #Mavericks
Study Day | Exploring Lee Priory: A Child of Strawberry Hill
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From Eventbrite:
Exploring Lee Priory: A Child of Strawberry Hill
Taddington Manor, Taddington, Near Cutsdean, Gloucestershire, 1 March 2016
Organized by Peter Lindfield
This study day, based at Architectural Heritage, Taddington Manor, Gloucestershire, explores the architecture of James Wyatt (1746–1813), the most famous architect of late Georgian Britain. The day will feature talks by experts on the architecture, interiors and furniture by James Wyatt, including the development of his architecturally-aware Gothic style at Lee Priory, Kent, before his most famous house, Fonthill Abbey, Wiltshire.
The relationship between Lee Priory and the most famous Gothic Revival house in Georgian Britain, Horace Walpole’s Strawberry Hill, will also be addressed. The conservator who worked on Strawberry Hill and a second, previously unknown, room saved from Lee Priory before its demolition in 1953, will speak about Wyatt’s work.
The highlight of the day will be the close examination of the second surviving room from Lee Priory, the Library Ante-Chamber. This room is currently for sale and the study day offers perhaps the last chance to be able to get up close and examine, under the guidance of experts, one of the most exciting Wyatt-related discoveries of the recent past.
Registration (£25) includes lunch and refreshments at Taddington Manor. Please do not hesitate to get in contact with the organiser, Dr Peter N. Lindfield, at: peter.lindfield@stirling.ac.uk. At time of booking, please advise of dietary or access requirements. Tuesday, 1 March 2016 from 10:30 to 16:30.
Art Institute of Chicago Receives $35Million Gift
Dorothy Braude Edinburg, a life-long collector and longtime supporter of the Art Institute of Chicago died last year at the age of 94. Her estate has just given more than $35million dollars to the museum, building upon earlier donations that established the Harry B. and Bessie K. Braude Memorial Collection in honor of her parents, who themselves were collectors—initially of eighteenth-century French furniture, Chinese porcelain, and artists books (additional information is available at Crain’s).
From Art Daily:
Douglas Druick, President and Eloise W. Martin Director of the Art Institute of Chicago announced today the largest bequest of funds in the museum’s history. The gift from long-time, generous benefactor and collector Dorothy Braude Edinburg provides more than $35 million to acquire new works of art to build on the Art Institute’s strong holdings in Prints and Drawings and Asian Art. Coming on the heels of the largest gift of art in the museum’s history, the Edlis/Neeson Collection in April 2015, the Edinburg gift offers exciting new momentum and opportunity to realize the museum’s ambitious long-range plan.
Dorothy Braude Edinburg (1920–2014)
“It was my great privilege to know and work with Dorothy for more than two decades, and we are thrilled and immensely grateful to receive this unparalleled bequest,” said Druick. “Together, with the leadership of Chair and Curator of Prints and Drawings Suzanne Folds McCullagh and our curatorial teams, we proudly embraced Dorothy’s extraordinary collection, and we will use this incredible funding to carry Dorothy’s vision forward—to inspire, educate, and delight future generations through the collection and presentation of exceptional art.”
David Hilliard, long-time Trustee of the Art Institute of Chicago and collector and connoisseur of prints and drawings, shared, “It was inspiring to see Dorothy build such an important and world-class collection—over the course of 23 years, Dorothy gifted the museum more than 1,500 works across six centuries and from many fields. This generous bequest ensures her collection will continue to inspire and educate the public, and embodies the excellence and mission of the Art Institute. It’s an honor to support the stewardship of her legacy.”
In 2013, through a landmark gift of more than 1000 works of art to the museum, Dorothy Braude Edinburg established the Harry B. and Bessie K. Braude Memorial Collection in her parents’ honor. The collection’s breadth and scope of European prints and drawings, Chinese and Korean stonewares and porcelains, and Japanese printed books, continues to spark a deeper artistic dialogue across and within the museum’s permanent collection.
New Book | Giambattista Bodoni: His Life and His World
On the occasion of the publication of Valerie Lester’s Giambattista Bodoni: His Life and His World, the first English biography of the great typographer, PRPH Rare Books and David R. Godine, Publisher invite you to an exhibit of selected Bodoni masterworks at our New York Gallery, a five-minute walk from The Grolier Club, Wednesday, January 27, 2016, 7.30–10.00pm. Light refreshments will be served. Please RSVP to news@prphbooks.com. PRPH Rare Books, 26 East 64th Street, 3rd Floor , New York, NY 10065.
A brief catalogue of nineteen items related to Bodoni is available as a PDF file here»
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From David R. Godine:
Valerie Lester, Giambattista Bodoni: His Life and His World (Boston: David R. Godine, 2015), 280 pages, ISBN: 978-1567925289, $40.
A lively, lavishly illustrated biography of the great printer Bodoni, vividly describing his work, life, and times while justifying his reputation as the ‘prince of typographers’.
This is the first English-language biography of the relentlessly ambitious and incomparably talented printer Giambattista Bodoni (1740–1813). Born to a printing family in the small foothill town of Saluzzo, he left his comfortable life to travel to Rome in 1758 where he served as an apprentice of Cardinal Spinelli at the Propaganda Fide press. There, under the sponsorship of Ruggieri, his close friend, mentor, and protector, he learned all aspects of the printing craft. Even then, his real talent, indeed his genius, lay in type design and punchcutting, especially of the exotic foreign alphabets needed by the papal office to spread the faith.
His life changed when in 1768 at age 28 he was invited by the young Duke of Parma to abandon Rome for that very French city to establish and direct the ducal press. He remained in Parma, overseeing a vast variety of printing, some of it pedestrian, but much of it glorious. And all of it making use of the typefaces he personally designed and engraved.
This fine book goes beyond Bodoni’s capacity as a printer; it examines the life and times in which he lived, the turbulent and always fragile political climate, the fascinating cast of characters that enlivened the ducal court, the impressive list of visitors making the pilgrim- age to Parma, and the unique position Parma occupied, politically Italian but very much French in terms of taste and culture. Even the food gets its due (and in savory detail). The illustrations—of the city, of the press, of the types and matrices—are compelling enough, but most striking are the pages from the books he designed. And especially, pages from his typographic masterpiece, the Manuale Tipografico, painstakingly prepared by his wife Ghitta, posthumously published in two volumes, and displaying the myriad typefaces in multiple sizes that Bodoni had designed and engraved over a long and prolific career.
Intriguing, scholarly, visually arresting, and designed and printed to Bodoni’s standards, this title belongs on the shelf of any self-respecting bibliophile. It not only makes for compelling reading, it will be considered the biography of record of a great printer for years to come.
Valerie Browne Lester is an independent scholar, writer, and translator living in Boston. She is the author of Phiz: The Man Who Drew Dickens (2004), a biography of Hablot Knight Browne, Dickens’s principal illustrator who was also her great-great-grandfather. She translated Alain-Fournier’s Le Grand Meaulnes (The Magnificent Meaulnes, 2009), and has written poetry, plays, and articles.
New Book | Jacques-François Blondel
From Librairie Droz:
Aurélien Davrius, ed., Jacques-François Blondel, un architecte dans la « République des Arts » (Geneva: Librairie Droz, 2016), 752 pages, ISBN: 978-2600019514, 89€.
Au XVIIIe siècle, de nombreux architectes ont publié des traités ou des « Cours » sur leur art. L’un d’eux se distingue par la quantité et la qualité des livres qu’il publie : Jacques-François Blondel (1708/9–1774). Auteur majeur de la théorie architecturale, Blondel a su, au cœur des Lumières, redonner une actualité à l’architecture classique, en s’opposant à l’art rocaille qui domine alors. Pour Blondel, l’architecture possède une dimension encyclopédique – il mobilise à la fois les savoirs techniques et les différents arts –, mais aussi sociale – chacun est appelé à y participer. Les écrits de Blondel sont par ailleurs indissociables de son action pédagogique : avec la fondation de son Ecole des Arts, qui se propose de centraliser la diversité des compétences, il opère une véritable révolution pédagogique. Cet ouvrage rassemble les discours, mémoires, articles pour L’Encyclopédie et autres textes de Blondel, dans lesquels le professeur développe ses idées sur le « bon goût » en architecture. Pour la majeure partie inédits, ou jamais réédités depuis le XVIIIe siècle, ces documents renseignent sur les enjeux de l’art de bâtir au siècle des Lumières, ainsi que sur la transmission de la tradition nationale.
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Table des matières (more…)
Exhibition | China Observed
As noted at Art Daily:
China Observed: Historical Pictures by Chinese and Western Artists, 1750–1970
Hong Kong Maritime Museum, 7–14 October 2015
Mallett, New York, 21–31 January 2016
Chinese artist, late 18th century, one of a pair of paintings picturing Chinese Women Accompanied by Pipes and Pets, gouache on paper, 80 x 59 cm (London: The Martyn Gregory Gallery)
The world’s foremost expert in Chinese Export paintings, The Martyn Gregory Gallery of London, will exhibit 70 of these paintings (also known as China Coast or China Trade paintings), January 21–31, 2016, at Mallett, 929 Madison Avenue (at 74th Street). An exhibitor since 1990 at the annual Winter Antiques Show in New York, the gallery presents its first independent exhibition in the city with China Observed. These highly detailed works by Cantonese artists were bought by ships’ officers and merchants who came to trade at Canton (modern Guangzhou) in the 18th and early 19th centuries. Also on view will be paintings by Western artists who travelled to the East.
“New York has been one of the principal centers of the China Trade ever since America won its independence from Britain,” commented Martyn Gregory, “and the city still contains a wealth of China Trade pictures and keen collectors. We have always enjoyed coming to New York, and we look forward to meeting old friends and new enthusiasts in our new venue. We are bringing with us the finest collection of China Trade paintings to be found on the market at the present time, and perhaps for the foreseeable future.”
Among the most spectacular of the paintings by Chinese artists included in China Observed are detailed scenes of the ports visited by the Westerners: notably Canton, Hong Kong and Shanghai. One such example is The Hongs of Canton by an unknown Chinese artist, c. 1804. This oil on canvas (32 x 50 in.) is a large, impressive and finely detailed view of the hongs, or ‘Factories’, at Canton that commemorates the early years of direct trade between the United States and China. It also records a brief period when seven different nations (Great Britain, America, France, Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands and Spain) were all actively trading at Canton, the only Chinese port at which Western trade was permitted.
Another large and unusually well-painted harbor painting is Hong Kong from the Harbour by an unknown Chinese artist, late 1850s (oil on canvas, 26 x 44 in.). Here, the island of Hong Kong is pictured before the erection of the signaling station on the Peak in 1861. Less than 20 years had elapsed since the British hoisted the Union Jack on the shore of Hong Kong Island, but in the intervening period, most of the waterfront between Western District and East Point had been developed. Several well-known structures are included in the landscape, including the tower of St. John’s Cathedral, which can be seen above the smaller paddlesteamer, with Government House uphill to its right. In the harbor, a great variety of vessels can be seen, including a coastal junk, Tanka boats operated by blue-robed women, covered hulks (superannuated sailing ships converted for use as naval base), small sidewheelers and three-masted sailing ships flying the flags of Britain, France and the United States. A curiosity of the painting is the presence, towards the right of the harbor, of a junk-rigged vessel with additional jib and topsails in the Western fashion.
A Panoramic View of the Bund at Shanghai, with a Regatta in Progress, an oil on canvas (16¾ x 55¾ in.) by an unknown Chinese artist, is apparently the earliest detailed view of the Shanghai Bund. The picture, which is known in several versions, would have been executed no earlier than July 1849, when the British consulate was first established on this site (far right) and not later than 1851, by which time Jardine, Matheson had replaced the Chinese-roofed building seen here (to the left of the British consulate) by a larger structure with a Western-style roof.
Also to be seen in China Observed will be remarkable Chinese export portraits of Western visitors to China and painted ‘in the Western manner’. Portrait of William Read of Philadelphia by the Cantonese artist known as Spoilum (fl. c.1774–c. 1805), an oil on canvas (24 x 20 in.) is an outstanding example of this artist’s distinctive work. The sitter, William Read (1767–1846), made several voyages to China. His father, George Read, was one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence.
Trampling Down Loose Tea in Tea Chests at Canton, a gouache by a late 18th-century unknown Chinese artist (12½ x 10 in.; 31.7 x 25.4 cm.) is another highlight of China Observed. This painting is one of a set of eight scenes illustrating the production of tea from the earliest stages—picking tea in the mountains—to the late stage seen here, in which dark-suited Westerners sample the tea as animated Chinese figures press down the tea within the chests in which it will be exported to the West.
An unusual and early pair of suave Chinese women holding long tobacco pipes—one shown with a dog and the other with a green-eyed cat—are also included in the exhibition. A Pair of Paintings of Chinese Women accompanied by Pipes and Pets by a late eighteenth-century Chinese artist (gouache on paper, each 31½ x 23¼ in.; 80 x 59 cm) depicts in each scene a woman beside a latticework shutter, as if at a window, with flowering shrubs and birds beyond. Each woman wears a fur-lined robe and flower-bedecked headdress and holds up a long tobacco pipe. One woman is accompanied by a small dog, the other by a green-eyed cat; both are placed within painted trompe-l’oeil frames of differing design. These unusual pictures are precursors perhaps of the more standardized ‘beauties’, painted in oils, which were exported in the mid-nineteenth century.
China Observed will be on view from 10:00 to 6:00 daily. During the exhibition, inquiries can be directed via Mallett at 212.249.8783.
The catalogue is available as a PDF file for download here»
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Martyn Gregory, the proprietor for whom the gallery is named, has been an art dealer for more than 50 years. In 1977 the gallery held its first exhibition relating to the China Trade (Catalogue 18) following the discovery of an album containing over one hundred works relating to China at the time of the Second Opium War. It was from this beginning that the gallery developed its interest in the ever-intriguing subject of the China Trade and in the many artistic connections between China and the West. In addition to Mr. Gregory, Dr. Patrick Conner is a director of the gallery. He is a historian and lecturer and former Keeper of Fine Art at the Royal Pavilion in Brighton; he is also the author of the definite work on the legendary artist of the China Coast, George Chinnery and more recently a book on the ‘Hongs of Canton’, a study of the pictorial icons of the China Trade and the merchants who traded there.
The Martyn Gregory Gallery sells works that are often both historically significant and highly decorative. At least once a year, the gallery produces illustrated and scholarly catalogues on this area of specialty. For over 40 years it has been located at 34 Bury Street, St James’s in the West End of London.
Exhibition | Trading China: Paintings of the Porcelain Production Process
From the Hong Kong Maritime Museum:
Trading China: Paintings of the Porcelain Production Process in the Qing Dynasty
Hong Kong Maritime Museum, 23 October 2015 — 1 May 2016
This special exhibition showcases a series of 34 paintings recently acquired by the Museum that document the process of making and trading porcelain from the famous Jingdezhen kilns, from mining the clay to selling the porcelain to foreign merchants through local dealers. Painted for the Western market, these illustrations vividly capture the work of the many specialised labourers as well as the way in which the trade and transport of the finished porcelain was arranged.
From the 16th century, Western demand for Chinese porcelain, exported through Guangzhou, grew. The technique of overglaze enamel painting, which originated in the imperial workshops, was used at Jingdezhen from the early 18th century for the production of imperial, domestic and export wares, reinforcing its role as China’s largest porcelain production centre. This style was very popular and led to innovations in ceramic production in Europe.
The Hong Kong Maritime Museum is grateful to the late Susan Chen Hardy for her generous donation of this collection of paintings. Susan was a long-time supporter of the Museum and a passionate connoisseur and collector of Chinese art. She and her husband Anthony Hardy have made significant contributions to the Museum and we are very pleased to welcome this exceptional series of paintings into our permanent collection.
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The bi-lingual catalogue is available here
Trading China: Paintings of the Porcelain Production Process in the Qing Dynasty (Hong Kong: Hong Kong Maritime Museum, 2015), 88 pages, ISBN: 978-9881823380, HK$100.
This catalogue features a series of 34 paintings recently acquired by the Museum. The paintings document the process of making and trading porcelain from the famous Jingdezhen kilns in the 18th century. Introductory articles and appendices on surveys of Qing paintings on the porcelain production process in other collections are also included.
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A set of twelve Chinese pictures depicting the porcelain production process (from about 1803 and formerly belonging to Lord Grenville, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom) was shown at the Indianapolis Museum of Art as part of The Luxury of Tea and Coffee: An Exhibition of Chinese Export Porcelain from a Private Collection (April 2011 – March 2012). That set of gouaches has since been sold by Thomas Coulborn & Sons.
Enfilade 
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