Research Associate Annette Juliano Co-Curates "Art in Time of Chaos"
After nearly six years of planning, Art in A Time of Chaos: Masterworks from Six Dynasties China, 3rd-6th Centuries opened at the China Institute Gallery on September 29, 2016. This exhibition inaugurated the new location of the China Institute and Gallery, formerly at 125 East 65th Street, to 40 Rector Street in the flourishing financial district. Now in a completely re-designed venue on the second floor, the Gallery has doubled its size in a space which offers far more flexibility for a variety of shows.
A day before the opening, on September 28th, a convivial celebration with food, wine, and festive dress accompanied the ribbon cutting and the patrons’ preview of this innovative exhibition; the event drew a wide range of well-known visitors from New York’s art, museum and academic communities. I was so pleased that several members from the NYU community, ISAW and IFA, were able to attend, including Sören Stark, Lillian Tseng, Karen Rubinson, Bill Mak, Hsueh-man Shen and two ISAW graduate students, Shujing Wang and Fanghan Wang, with whom I have had the pleasure of working.
The exhibition had two goals: first, to emphasize the very considerable contributions of this period long described as China’s Dark Age, almost four hundred years of barbarian invasion, civil strife, and rebellion that divided China into north and south; and second, to contrast the culture and accomplishments of the Northern Dynasties ruled by the powerful Tuoba Xianbei nomadic tribe, with the culture of the Southern Dynasties, which preserved the Chinese imperial legacy from the preceding Han empire. More than one hundred objects were selected from museums in two cities: Nanjing, Jiangsu province, capital of the Southern Dynasties, and Taiyuan, Shanxi province, one of the important capitals during the Northern Dynasties. One hundred and thirteen objects have been divided into four sections reflecting important areas of accomplishment during The Six Dynasties: ceramics, sculpture, calligraphy and painting.
Within each section, the examples chosen contrast north and south while also highlighting the exchange of influences between the regions, and marking the impact of West Asian cultures through the Silk Route trade.
I have included a few examples across the four sections to reflect the enormous diversity of the objects. The ceramics section focused on the development of celadon ware with the green glaze that achieved recognition in West by the 13th century. The sculpture section shows an intriguing contrast in the subject matter of clay tomb figures, with military dominating in the north and ladies with elaborate hair styles in the south. In the North, Buddhist sculpture, particularly large scale images and cave temples, were the most significant innovations.
Although Buddhists had imperial patronage in the South, much less has survived, because perishable materials, such as wood, were plentiful and were commonly used. The section on calligraphy contains mostly rubbings from carved stone stelae which happily preserved the extraordinary stylistic and aesthetic developments of eminent calligraphers such as Wang Xizhi. Some related paraphernalia such as water droppers and ink stones are also shown. Finally, the section on painting displays secondary evidence from tombs which reveals what painting styles had developed, although the actual images on silk did not survive.
Fragments of paintings from tomb walls capture brush styles, while stamped bricks from the walls captured the energy of the famous lost paintings of the Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove.
The exhibition has been very well received and on November 18th received a full page review by Holland Cotter, art critic for the New York Times…and he mentioned the names of the curators which he does not always do!
Read more about Annette Juliano's research and work at ISAW on her biography page here.