THE GLOBAL LIVES OF A FEMALE DANCER
4 door honderden speciaal daartoe opgeleide kunstenaars. Hoewel het daar
sinds de economische crisis van 2007 veel minder goed gaat, kon ieder
van de schilders in Dafen op het hoogtepunt van de productie per dag
circa wintig ‘Zonnebloemen’ van Van Gogh maken.
In tegenstelling tot het gezelschap uit Jiangxi dat samenkwam in de
abrikozentuin, betrof het in het Rijksmuseum een groep uit verschillende
landen, maar dat neemt niet weg dat er ook ‘politieke’ bedoelingen achter
de organisatie van dit evenement staken. Het is voor de VVAK belangrijk
nieuwe, en liefst jonge, leden te werven, en om relevant te blijven in
de educatieve onwikkeling van de volgende generatie studenten die
interesse hebben voor Aziatische Kunst. Het was dan ook een groot
plezier om te zien hoe deze groep zich boog over soms heel onverwachte
aspecten van Aziatische kunst.
Net zoals de teksten op de Elegante bijeenkomst in de abrikozentuin pas
na voltooiing van het schilderij toegevoegd werden, zijn vijf lezingen na
aloop van het symposium verder bewerkt en in deze uitgave opgenomen.
Rest mij nog iedereen die aan het succes van deze dag heeft meegewerkt
hartelijk te danken, in het bijzonder de Hulsewé-Wazniewski Stichting
voor het sponsoren van de lezing van Winnie Wong, de VVAK voor de
genereuze ondersteuning van de dag zelf, en Eveline Kamstra die het
mogelijk heeft gemaakt deze vijf artikelen te publiceren. U bent allen van
harte welkom bij het volgende studentensymposium dat waarschijnlijk in
2018 zal plaatsvinden.
• Anne Gerritsen is Associate Professor in de Chinese geschiedenis aan de
Universiteit van Warwick (Engeland). Zij heeft in Leiden Chinees gestudeerd, The kitchen in Petronella Oortman’s doll’s house is on the lower left side
en is gepromoveerd aan de universiteit van Harvard. Recentelijk richt ze haar (ig. 1). four painted panels are pasted onto the kitchen cabinet. The irst
onderzoek op de materiële cultuur van China, in het bijzonder porselein, en panel on the left features a female dancer accompanied by three igures in
op de plaatselijke en globale geschiedenis van het produceren van porselein in
Jingdezhen (China). Tussen 2013 en 2018 bekleedt zij de Kikkoman Chair for the
Study of Asia-Europe Intercultural Dynamics aan de Universiteit Leiden.
no ot
1. Yin Ji’nan, ‘Politics or Entertainment? Examining Jiangxi Scholar Oicials and
Zhejiang Painters through the Lens of Elegant Gathering in the Apricot Garden’,
in: Craig Clunas, Jessica Harrison-Hall and Yu Ping Luk (eds.), Ming China: the motif of a dancer, the other three panels are all mirrored copies of
Courts and Contacts, 1400-1450, London, British Museum Press, 2016, pp. 99-105.
5 He Feng *
THE GLOBAL LIVES Of A fEMALE DANCER:
TRANSCULTURAL IDENTITIES Of A CHINESE
PAINTING MOTIf 1
There are always many children surrounding the doll’s houses in Room
2.20 at the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam. Siting, kneeling, or standing
on tiptoe, their fascination for the exhibits allows other visitors few
opportunities to observe every chamber in the doll’s houses, let alone
the many tiny details, which means they might have missed something
amazing.
This essay touches on the changing identities of a pictorial motif: a
Chinese dancing woman, who in most cases is accompanied by musicians
in a garden. The motif was appropriated in the decorative arts in the
Netherlands and Germany during the second half of the 17th century
and the 18th century. Back in its original Chinese context, the cultural
identities atached to the dancer have changed signiicantly since the
Wanli period (r. 1573-1620) of the Ming dynasy (1368-1644).
Dancer motif in the Netherlands and Germany
in the 17th and 18th centuries
the foreground of a garden. The painting captures the moment when the
dancer, on a carpet and dancing to the rhythm of music, raises her right
leg and arm. Two musicians in front of her are playing drum and lute.
Another igure stands to the side, gazing at the dancer and seemingly
enjoying the performance.
Previous research has shown that apart from the painted panels with
prints in the album Picturae Sinicae ac Suratenae (‘Pictures of China and
Surat’).2 The album was drawn by Petrus Schenk Sr. in 1702 and is now in
the Kupferstich-Kabinet collection of the Dresden State Art Collection.
Petrus Schenk Jr. published another album of Chinese landscapes and
igure paintings in which he depicted a scene of a Chinese female dancer
and three musicians. This later album, dated beween 1727 and 1775, was
designed as a patern book for ceramic production.3 A Delfware dish in
the Rijksmuseum has the dancer motif as central decoration, although an
admiring young atendant has replaced the musicians.4
On 18 May 1678, Delft poter Pieter fransen van der Lee was invited
to Berlin by friedrich Wilhelm (1620-1688), Elector of Brandenburg
(popularly known as ‘the Great Elector’).5 Van der Lee was appointed
 6 7
Fig. 1 supervisor of the Berlin faience manufactory until his death in 1680, when
Petronella Oortman’s Gerhard Molin took over the function. Molin died in 1693, and his widow’s
doll’s house, oak,
second husband, Gerhard Wolbeer, ran the factory thereafter.6 It was
veneered with
tortoiseshell and under Wolbeer’s supervision that a gourd-shaped faience vase with the
tin, h. 255 x w. 190 x dancer motif was produced in Berlin.7 It is possible that the patern book
d. 78 x d. 28 cm, was handed down during the change of leadership at the Berlin faience
Amsterdam, ca. 1686-
manufactory, after which the dancer motif entered Germany. Considering
ca. 1710, Rijksmuseum
Amsterdam, inv.no.
the many places the dancer has travelled to, it seems practical to ask: who
BK-NM-1010 is she?
Dancer motif in the context of Chinese material culture
The dance with wo outstretched sleeves is, literally, the ‘sleeve dance’
(xiuwu). It dates to the Han dynasy (202 BCE-220 CE). Archaeological
excavations in Guangzhou revealed its ancient origin when a jade igurine
of a woman performing the sleeve dance was found in 1983. This igurine,
from the tomb of the second Nanyue King, Zhao Mo (r. 137-125 BCE),
measures only 3.5 centimetres in height. The sleeve dance was extremely
popular down the centuries, but its pictorial representation peaked in the
Ming dynasy. The Chinese painter Qiu Ying (ca. 1494-ca. 1552) created
three extraordinary handscrolls depicting historic stories from the Han
dynasy, namely the Hangong chunxiao tu (‘Spring Morning in the Han
Palace’, hereafter ‘the Spring Palace’), the Bai mei tu (‘One Hundred
Fig. 1a (left) Beauties’), and the Hujia shiba pai tu (‘Eighteen Songs of a Nomad flute’,
Detail of ig. 1. the story of Lady Wen-Chi, hereafter ‘the Eighteen Songs’).8 All three
Photograph: He Feng
handscrolls feature the dancer motif, either alone or in pairs. In the
Fig. 1b (right) Spring Palace, the wo sisters, Zhao feiyan and Zhao Hede, danced with
Detail of ig. 1a. each other, and both became imperial concubines of the Han-dynasy
Photograph: Cheng emperor (r. 33-37 BCE). The paintings ‘One Hundred Beauties’ and
Bulletin van het
‘the Eighteen Songs’ both depict a single dancer, which can be seen as
Rijksmuseum 3/4
(1964)
protoypes of the depictions on the panels in the doll’s house as well as of
the dancer motif on porcelain that will be discussed later. The protoype
of single dancer derives from the protoype of paired dancers, both lifting
their left arms and legs.
following Qiu Ying’s paintings, the dancer motif was adapted in
woodblock prints from the Wanli to Chongzhen eras (1573-1644) and in
lacquer screens produced during the Kangxi period (1662-1722). The irst
half of the 17th century witnessed the dancing girl as a superstar in book
culture. five illustrated books used this motif to tell various stories. The
dancer becomes Zhang Chuchen in Chongjiao hongfu ji (‘Re-collated Story
of Hongfu nü’, 1601); she becomes an anonymous performer in Tu Long’s
(1543-1605) Xinke quanxiang tanhua ji (‘Newly Cut Complete Pictorial
of Night-blooming flower’, no later than 1605); she becomes Huang
Shunhua in Huancuitang xinbian toutao ji (‘Huancuitang Newly Edited
Story of the Peach’, no later than 1619); and she becomes Yang Taizhen in
 8
Fig. 2
Jar, polychrome
overglaze enamel on
porcelain, h. 36.6 x
d. rim 20 x d. 33.8 x
d. footring 20.3 cm,
Jingdezhen, ca. 1645-
ca. 1660, Rijksmuseum
Amsterdam, inv.no.
AK-NM-6462
wo illustrations in Tangminghuang qiuye wutong yu (‘Tang Minghuang
[Listening to] the Rain falling on Chinese Parasols at an Autumn Night’, in
wo edited volumes dated 1619 and 1633).
Six- or welve-fold lacquer screens provided a much larger surface for
artists to portray the composition of the Spring Palace. Examples are
on display in the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, and in the Museum of
Decorative Arts in Dresden.9 Similar lacquer screens can be found in the
Chinese lacquer room of the Rijksmuseum and the freer Gallery of Art,
and Christie’s in Paris sold one in December 2016.10
During the Shunzhi period (1644-1661), the dancer motif started to be
applied to polychrome and blue-and-white porcelain. A baluster jar of
polychrome enamel in the Rijksmuseum collection features the dancer and
a female orchestra performing for a noble lady (ig. 2). This jar is among
the earliest examples of Chinese porcelain with the dancer motif that
originated with Qiu Ying’s paintings. During the Kangxi emperor’s reign
(1662-1722), underglaze blue vessels produced by oicial and civilian kilns
used this motif with slight variations: adding details to the costume and
furniture, reducing the number of musicians, or adding a more intimate
Fig. 3 performance space within architectural setings. Jingdezhen ceramic
Dish, underglaze craftsmen even added exquisite details to form a multi-layered space with
cobalt blue on
diferent groups of beholders, such as a dish in the porcelain department
porcelain,
h. 5 x d. rim 34.7 x of the Dresden State Art Collection (ig. 3). The Victoria and Albert
d. footring 19.2 cm, Museum has garnitures with the motif in its collection.
Jingdezhen, 1662-1722,
Porzellansammlung,
From classical motif to decorative icon
Staatliche Kunst-
sammlungen Dresden,
inv.no PO 1289. from the original paintings by Qiu Ying and the book illustrations
Photograph: Adrian mentioned above, we can see that multiple cultural identities were
Sauer assigned to the dancer in Ming China. Although Qing court painters
imitated the pictorial theme of the Spring Palace numerous times, the
dancer on Qing porcelain lost her cultural identiy during the process
of mass production. In European cultures, the dancer motif became a
decorative icon that ornamented walls, was depicted on faience and
porcelain, and was re-created and transformed in various media. It was
still welcome in 20th-century Europe, not as representation of a dancer
or a speciic historical igure, but to evoke China and Europe’s entangled
past. This evocation resounded in exhibition halls in Amsterdam and
Berlin, as well as in a studio once located in Nice, france.
 10

Fig. 4a There, in february 1944, Henri Cartier-Bresson took a photograph of

Chintz, stain-dyed Henri Matisse painting a portrait of his model Micaela Avogadro. A stain-
cotton (detail),
dyed coton chintz cloth from the Indian Coromandel Coast (identical to
170 × 235 cm, Indian
Coromandel Coast, the example in the Groninger Museum) was hung on the studio wall, with
ca. 1750, Groninger the Chinese dancer witnessing the scene (ig. 4a and 4b).
Museum, inv.no. 1989-
0328 • He Feng is a PhD candidate at the Institute of East Asian Art History, and
a doctoral fellow at the Cluster of Excellence ‘Asia and Europe in a Global
Fig. 4b (right)
Context’, Universiy of Heidelberg. Formerly an assistant curator in the Museum
Henri Cartier-Bresson,
of Shanghai Universiy, he is now writing a dissertation on the 17th- and 18th-
French painter
Henri Matisse, with
century transcultural appropriation of Chinese narrative motifs in European
his model Micaela decorative arts. He Feng is also interested in cultural biography, material agency,
Avogadro. Nice, and historical sociology.
France, February
1944. Magnum Photos,
image reference l i t erat ure
PAR18580 (HCB1951007
W00957/12A)
Ban Gu, Han shu [The History of the former Han Dynasy], Zhonghua Book
Company, Beijing, 1962.
A.L. den Blaauwen, ‘Ceramiek met chinoiseriën naar prenten van Petrus Schenk
Jr.’, Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum 2 (1964), pp. 35-47, 49-50.
Oto von falke, ‘Berliner fayence: Sonderausstellung im Schlossmuseum’, in:
Adolph Donath (ed.), Der Kunswanderer: Zeitschrift für alte und neue Kunst, für
Kunstmarkt und Sammelwesen, Berlin, 1922, pp. 3-6.

12 J. fontein and A. L. den Blaauwen, ‘“Picturae Sinicae ac Suratenae” van Petrus
Schenk Sr.’, Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum 3/4 (1964), pp. 91-101.
Christiaan J. A. J̈rg, Famille Verte: Chinese Porcelain in Green Enamels, Groninger
Museum, Groningen, 2011.
Christiane Keisch, ‘Berliner fayence: Ein Diskurs über Vorbilder, Werkstäten
und Stil’, in: Christiane Keisch and Susanne Netzer (eds.), Herrliche Künste und
Manufacturen: Fayence, Glas und Tapisserien aus der Frühzeit Brandenburg-
Preußens 1680-1720, Kunstgewerbemuseum SMB, Berlin, 2001, pp. 22-57.
Horst Mauter, ‘Zur Geschichte der Berliner fayencemanufakturen von 1678 bis
ewa 1779’, in: Zur Wirtschafts- und Sozialgeschichte Berlins vom 17. Jahrhundert LATE 14TH TO 15TH CENTURIES
bis zur Gegenwart, Jahrbuch für Wirtschaftsgeschichte, Sonderband, Akademie
Verlag, Berlin, 1986, pp. 29-66.
not es
*
Revised by Mark Poysden
1. I am grateful to Sarah E. fraser, Cora Würmell, Anne Gerritsen, and the
atendees of the 2016 VVAK Student Symposium for suggestions and comments.
My thanks to Christiaan J̈rg for pointing out the stain-dyed coton chintz in
Groninger Museum, and to Pieter Arïns Kappers for his advice on Han-dynasy
ceramic igurines.
2. fontein and den Blaauwen 1964: 100.
3. Den Blaauwen 1964: 35-47.
4. Keisch 2001: 43.
5. Mauter 1986: 40.
6. falke 1922: 4.
7. See the object in Kunstgewerbemuseum, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin (inv.no.
W-1963.9).
8. All three paintings are in collection of the National Palace Museum, Taipei.
There are wo copies of Qiu Ying’s ‘Spring Morning’ in National Palace Museum,
both considered authentic.
9. See the lacquer screen in Ashmolean Museum, dated 1662-1700 (inv.no.
EAX 5331), and the lacquer screen in Kunstgewerbemuseum, Staatliche
Kunstsammlungen Dresden, dated 1692 (inv.no. 37333).
10. See Christie’s sale 13282, lot 85, dated 1686 based on inscriptions on the reverse.
FROM THE PICTURE GALLERY OF CHINA
13 Yu Yusen *
fROM THE PICTURE GALLERY Of CHINA:
A GLIMPSE INTO THE PERSIANATE COLLECTING
Of CHINESE RELIGIOUS PAINTING IN THE
In his relective study on the collection of early Chinese painting in Japan,
James Cahill contended that ‘any full account of the survival of Chinese
paintings should include a chapter titled In Praise of Bad Taste’, for
many of the paintings deemed as ‘bad’ by the orthodox Chinese criteria
of literati connoisseurs were instead favoured by collectors outside
China,1 early in Japan, and then Europe and America. Without these
collectors and their collections the history of Chinese painting would be
far less interesting. A well-known example is the collection of Japanese
Sōgenga (literally, Song-Yuan painting) amassed during the Kamakura and
Muromachi periods (12th-16th centuries). In many if not all cases, these
Chinese paintings, collected by Japanese monks, shoguns or others, relect
Japanese preferences such as their obsession with paintings of Chan
eccentrics or wandering saints like Hanshan, Shide, fenggan and Budai,
which were not contemporaneously treasured in China.2 Consequently,
and intriguingly, today the largest surviving corpus of such paintings is in
Japan, as are numerous Japanese imitations of varying qualities.
In recent decades, the migration of these Chinese ‘peripheral’ paintings
within the East Asian cultural sphere has become the subject of serious
study and a growing public enthusiasm. What is less studied – and
therefore not so widely known – is that in addition to Japan, Korea and
Vietnam, Chinese paintings also travelled wesward to Central Asia and
Iran, to the Persianate Islamic societies, in the same periods. This essay
therefore seeks to guide readers to ‘look through a tube at a leopard’3
and focus on three interesting representations of Chinese wandering
saints from the Persian collection of Chinese paintings that I am
currently studying. These copies were made by Persian court painters
after Chinese models (igs. 1-3), which were brought to Central Asia
and Iran during the Mongol and Post-Mongol periods, in particular, the
Timurid dynasy (ca. 1370-1507) of Turkic–Mongol origin named after the
founder Timur (Tamerlane). The period of Timurid rule was renowned
for its vibrant lourishing of artistic and intellectual life in Central Asia
and Iran, in which album (muraqqa) making in the codex form started to
emerge in the Persianate courtly milieu. During the 15th and 16th centuries
Chinese paintings and their Persian copies were cut up or dismantled, and
then pasted in diferent folios as parts of the albums.
The three paintings under discussion are from albums currently housed in
Istanbul and Berlin. They include wo paintings, pasted on diferent album
folios: one is an image of the Daoist deities Li Tieguai and Liu Haichan
(ig. 2); the other shows the eccentric Buddhist sage poets Hanshan
and Shide (ig. 1), which, according to the recent reconstruction by