Harvard's Arthur M. Sackler Museum Features Botanical Motifs and Symbols in East Asian Painting
Exhibition Highlights Two Important Korean Acquisitions and a Notable Rediscovery
CAMBRIDGE, MA (August 23, 2002)-Harvard's Arthur M. Sackler Museum is now presenting Plum, Orchid, Chrysanthemum, and Bamboo: Botanical Motifs and Symbols in East Asian Painting, on display through January 5, 2003.
Drawn mainly from the Sackler's permanent collection, the 87 objects in the exhibition explore a number of botanical themes that are popular in China, Korea, and Japan, and reveal an interconnectedness among the arts of those countries. The exhibition, which was organized by Robert D. Mowry, Alan J. Dworsky Curator of Chinese Art, and the Department of Asian Art, features a number of newly acquired works, including two Korean screens that rank among the most important Korean paintings in the West.
"We have been adding carefully to the Sackler Museum's already very important holdings in Asian art," said James Cuno, Elizabeth and John Moors Cabot Director of the Harvard University Art Museums. "Robert Mowry has a fine eye that is evident everywhere in this beautiful selection of pieces from our permanent collection."
East Asian paintings fall into five basic categories of subject matter: landscape paintings, figure paintings, narrative and historical paintings, religious paintings, and so-called "bird-and-flower" paintings, the group to which most of the works in the exhibition belong. Many botanical motifs also have symbolic overtones. Thus, the bamboo, which retains its green leaves year round and is able to bend in strong winds, is seen as a symbol of strength in the face of adversity, and the peony, with its numerous petals, is viewed as a symbol of wealth. In the Korean tradition, the flowering plum, orchid, chrysanthemum, and bamboo-four botanical subjects said to embody the virtues of modesty, loyalty, purity, and integrity-are popularly known as the "Four Gentlemen."
"This exhibition presents a selection of later Chinese, Korean, and Japanese paintings that feature popular botanical themes and symbols as their principal subject matter, complemented by a variety of ceramics, lacquers, and other decorative arts graced with similar motifs," said Mowry. "Equally important, the exhibition showcases a number of recent acquisitions of Korean paintings and of Chinese ceramics."
The newly acquired Korean screens in Plum, Orchid, Chrysanthemum, and Bamboo are an eight-panel screen painted in ink on paper by Yu Tôk-chang (1675-1756), titled Bamboo through the Four Seasons, and a ten-panel screen painted in ink on silk in 1892 by Yi Ha-ûng (1820-1898), titled Orchids and Rocks. Yu Tôk-chang was Korea's most famous painter of bamboo during the Chosôn dynasty (1392-1910); Yi Ha-ûng was not only the Chosôn dynasty's foremost painter of orchids, but a royal prince and the father of the last Korean king.
Plum, Orchid, Chrysanthemum, and Bamboo is arranged in three separate rooms, with objects from China in the first, Korea in the second, and Japan in the third. The exhibition also includes a newly acquired Chinese scroll by Ren Yi (1840-1896), Kingfisher over a Lotus Pond; 15 newly acquired Chinese ceramics (plus six important loans); four recently acquired Korean paintings (aside from the screens); and a recently acquired Japanese lacquer.
Rediscovery
Featured in the Chinese gallery of the exhibition is Small, Broad-Shouldered Jar with Decoration of the Eight Buddhist Treasures. When this object entered the collections of the Sackler Museum, in 1979, it was assumed to have been an 18th-century copy of a lost original. Its decoration, in doucai technique, combining underglaze cobalt blue and overglaze enamel, linked this jar to the porcelains made during the Chenghua reign (1465-1487) of the Ming dynasty (1368-1644), as did the mark reading tian ("Heaven") inscribed on its base. But the lack of a single identical Chenghua example made any attempt to attribute this jar to the 15th century nearly impossible.
In 1999, further research on this jar, alongside photographs of a reconstructed but virtually identical Chenghua-period doucai jar, revealed this porcelain piece to be a 15th-century original. With its official reattribution to the Chenghua period, it has instantly risen to the status of a National Treasure. Fewer than 50 doucai-enameled porcelains from the Chenghua period are known worldwide. Moreover, doucai enameled jars with the tian mark (instead of the usual six-character imperial reign mark) are regarded as the very best of all Chenghua porcelains. Of the 12 intact small doucai jars of this type known worldwide, this is the only example in the United States.
Public Programming in conjunction with this exhibition:
Docent-led tours:
Friday, September 13, at 12:15 p.m.
Wednesday, October 9, at 12:15 p.m.
Gallery talks:
Sunday, September 22, at 2 p.m. with Anne Rose Kitagawa, assistant curator of Japanese art.
Sunday, October 20, at 2 p.m. with Melissa Moy, assistant curator of Chinese art.
Sunday, December 15, at 2 p.m. with Anne Rose Kitagawa, assistant curator of Japanese art.
About the Harvard University Art Museums
The Harvard University Art Museums are one of the world's leading arts institutions, with the Arthur M. Sackler, Busch-Reisinger, and Fogg art museums, the Straus Center for Conservation, and the U.S. headquarters for the Archaeological Exploration of Sardis, an excavation project in western Turkey.
The Harvard University Art Museums are distinguished by the range and depth of their collections, their groundbreaking exhibitions, and the original research of their staff. As an integral part of the Harvard community, the three art museums serve as a resource for all students, adding a special dimension to their areas of study. The public is welcome to experience the collections and exhibitions as well as to enjoy lectures, symposia, and other programs.
For more than a century, the Harvard University Art Museums have been the nation's premier training ground for museum professionals and scholars and are renowned for their role in the development of the discipline of art history in this country.
Location and Hours
The Fogg Art Museum and the Busch-Reisinger Museum are located at 32 Quincy Street in Cambridge. The Arthur M. Sackler Museum is located next door at 485 Broadway. Each Museum is a short walk from the Harvard Square MBTA station.
Hours are Monday through Saturday, 10 a.m. - 5 p.m., Sunday 1 - 5 p.m., the Museums are closed on national holidays. Admission is $6.50; $5 for seniors; $5 for students; and free for those under 18 years of age. The Museums are free Saturday mornings, 10 a.m. until noon. The Harvard University Art Museums receive support from the Massachusetts Cultural Council. More detailed information is available by calling 617-495-9400, or on the Internet at www.artmuseums.harvard.edu.
# # #
For more information on this project or the Harvard University Art Museums, please contact:
Matthew Barone
Harvard University Art Museums
tel 617-495-2397; fax 617-496-9762
mbarone@fas.harvard.edu
or
Kim Gilbert/Allison Derusha
Resnicow Schroeder Associates
tel 212-671-5157; fax 212-595-8354
kgilbert@resnicowschroeder.com
aderusha@resnicowschroeder.com