Description:
Framed oil painting of the hongs or foreign factories on the Pearl River, which provided offices and residences for Western merchants during their stay in Canton (Guangzhou). Unlike watercolors or calligraphy, oil painting was not an indigenous art form in China. Introduced by the Jesuit missionaries in the early Qing Dynasty (1644-1911), oil painting did not find favor at the Imperial court, which considered it a Western novelty. However, Cantonese artists embraced oil painting in order to meet the demands of foreign merchants along with ivory miniatures, gouache and watercolors, and reverse paintings on glass, all part of a thriving industry geared toward the production of graphic arts for Western merchants and traders. These images provided foreigners with souvenirs of their stay in China, as well as visual illustrations of their adventures for friends and family back home. The few painters working in Canton before 1800 included Spoilum (active 1774-1805), Pu Qua, Cinqua, and Chitqua (a sculptor who also may have painted). These painters worked in a style that combined elements of Chinese art with the Western concept of perspective. Earlier landscapes and portraits, like this example, lacked a complete understanding of the technique; the resulting paintings exhibited a flat, primitive quality. This painting came perhaps originally from a set of 4 images of Canton, Whampoa Anchorage, Boca Tigris, and Macao. The flags flying in the courtyards (left to right) represent: Denmark, Spain (the Phillipine Company), Sweden, England, and Holland; there is an empty flagpole between the Spanish and Swedish flags. The western-style hongs have two floors: the ground floors had counting rooms, money safes, storage rooms, and packing spaces for tea, silks, and porcelains; the upper floors had offices, dining and bedrooms. Between the long factory buildings, Chinese shopkeepers occupied a few narrow streets or alleys named Old China Street, New China Street, and Hog Lane. There they sold lacquer ware, furniture, silver, porcelains, and other novelty items designed to appeal to Western merchants and sailors. The river has chop boats and junks, one of which has an eagle depicted on its stern; small figures are visible on some of the boats.
Link to share this object record:
https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=HD+60.062 |
