:::

CASTIGLIONE IN CONTEXT

This accompanying exhibition enables visitors to understand the intellectual and cultural context within which Giuseppe Castiglione (Lang-Shining) produced his highly influential artwork. Through prints, early books, porcelain, and paintings, viewers can see the significant role played by Jesuit missionaries, such as Castiglione, in the late Ming and Qing dynasties. Invited by the emperors, Castiglione and other Jesuits put their scientific and artistic skills to work for the imperial court. Their presence both inside and outside of the Beijing court initiated the first sharing of Eastern and Western philosophical and scientific knowledge as well as the development of new artistic practices. While the Jesuits introduced European artistic naturalism and perspective to the Chinese court artists, they in turn exposed the Jesuits to new artistic technologies such as silk-making and porcelain. The exhibition demonstrates this ongoing exchange in Chinese porcelains made for European export with European forms and scenes; in translations of seminal texts into each other's languages (Euclid and Confucius shown here); in the production of the first topographic map of a country; and of course in Castiglione's famous paintings, which blend European naturalism and Chinese landscape aesthetic. The exhibition concludes with the 1938 "Portrait of Matteo Ricci," attributed to Xu Beihong, testifying to the significance of the Jesuit influence through the twentieth century.

Curator：Dr. Isabelle Frank

We would like to thank the following institutions for generously loaning objects for the exhibition:

The University of Hong Kong Museum and Art Gallery 
The University of Hong Kong Libraries 
Hong Kong University of Technology and Science 
Chinese University of Hong Kong 
Hong Kong Maritime Museum

ABOUT EXHIBITS

I: Jesuits in China

Matteo Ricci (left) and Paul Xu Guangqi, from La Chine d'Athanase Kirchere de la Compagnie de Jesus: illustrée de plusieurs monuments tant sacrés que profanes, Amsterdam, 1670. Plate facing p. 201. (Translation of: Athanasii Kircheri e Soc. Jesu China monumentis ... Amstelodami, 1667). Digital Scan from Villanova University, Falvey Memorial Library

The Jesuits entered China from Macao in 1582, intending to bring Catholicism to this vast country. Led by Matteo Ricci (1552-1610), who joined the Imperial court in Beijing in 1601, they attempted to absorb as much as possible of Chinese culture in order to engage more effectively with the local inhabitants. The Jesuits learned Chinese and studied Chinese philosophy, religion, and science; to raise their status in the eyes of the local population, they acquired Chinese names and abandoned European, religious clothing. Instead they dressed like respected Confucian scholars, with long beards and hair, and engaged in intellectual debates about the arts, sciences, and philosophy. As their strategy evolved, the Jesuits focused on befriending (and, they hoped, converting) the Emperor and the elites, who could in turn spread Catholicism to the larger population. In particular, Ricci sought to find commonalities between Confucianism and Catholicism, even arguing that the practice of ancestor worship was compatible with Christian practices — an opinion later rejected by other Catholic orders and the Papacy. Ricci also introduced such classic scientific texts to China as the first elements of Euclidean geometry, translated into Chinese with the help of Xu Guangqi, completed the first Portuguese-Chinese dictionary, and wrote a treatise criticizing Buddhism. Ricci's legacy was carried on both by native-born converts and later Jesuit arrivals, such as the painter Giuseppe Castiglione.

II: Appeal of the Jesuits

The Observatory at Peking, The General History of China ..., from the French ..., vol. 3, Jean-Baptiste Du Halde, London: J. Watts, 1739, 2nd edition; photo courtesy of The University of Hong Kong Libraries

The Jesuits' scientific and technical knowledge appealed to Emperor Kangxi (1661-1722). A turning point in the Jesuits' reception at court came in 1669 when they calculated solar eclipses more correctly than their Chinese counterparts. Word of this success quickly spread and confirmed the European sense of superiority, naively displayed in this fanciful French depiction of Chinese astronomers using new "European" instruments (the reality, as the Jesuits knew, was quite different). Thereafter, Kangxi allowed them to run the imperial observatory and began drawing on their military, geographic, and technological knowledge to support his various projects. He was especially impressed by the Jesuits' skills in cartography and, with their help, commissioned a map of his empire, the first accurate one of an entire country (reproduced here in different European versions). During the reign of Kangxi's successor, Yongzheng (1723-1735), tensions grew between China and the foreign missionaries, leading to their expulsion and the persecution of Christians. An important exception to this edict was made for Jesuits working as imperial servants in Beijing, whose expertise Yongzheng wished to retain; they, like Castiglione, stayed at the court in the hope of softening attitudes towards Jesuits and Catholicism in general.

A Sketch of the Hollows or Sites of the [Heart] Beats

III: Cross Cultural Exchanges

A Sketch of the Hollows or Sites of the [Heart] Beats…, Specimen medicinae sinicae ... A. Cleyer, ed. and M. Boym, Frankfurt: Joannis Petri Zubrot, 1682; photo courtesy of Hong Kong University of Science and Technology

The Jesuit missionaries at the Qing court became immersed in Chinese philosophy, science, and religion, making these available for the first time to Western readers. They translated Confucius into Latin, for instance, presenting his writings as compatible with some aspects of Catholicism. At the same time, the Jesuits' rich documentation of Chinese life was welcomed by European scholars who republished, translated, and disseminated their texts in multiple editions. Their interests ranged from Chinese medicine and numerical systems, to religious ceremonies and local flora and fauna; their publications also inspired those of other foreigners traveling in China. Just as the Chinese literati learned about European perspective, three-dimensional shading, and naturalism in painting, so too did the Jesuits learn about the Chinese "literati-style," whose more abstract paintings focused on the essence of landscapes, beings, and forms. Despite their general openness to Chinese culture, the Jesuits did not appreciate the aesthetics of Chinese painting because it lacked qualities valued in European art, and prized instead the high quality of Chinese decorative arts, especially porcelain. They facilitated the growing commerce in these goods, commissioned their own porcelain, and documented porcelain and silk production. Likewise, Chinese artists treated European painting's dependence on physical likeness and three-dimensionality as a curiosity, but not as an artistic style, because it eradicated the "aesthetic" quality of forms. To please the emperor, Jesuit court artists, like Giuseppe Castiglione, attempted to elaborate an artistic style balanced between the two.

Blue and White Dish Decorated with a Portuguese or Dutch Ship in Full Sail

IV: Fusion

Blue and White Dish Decorated with a Portuguese or Dutch Ship in Full Sail, surrounded by Alternating Panels of a Boy Holding Lotus and Brocade Design, Qing Dynasty, c. 1710, Porcelain; photo courtesy of Hong Kong Maritime Museum

The growing demand for Chinese porcelain in Europe coincided with the popularity of "Chinoiserie" in European decorative arts — a fantasy "oriental" style — and resulted in the creation of a new hybrid, ceramic style in China. To please the foreign market, Chinese manufacturers combined the shapes of European platters with Chinese painted scenes of new subjects; these included "typical" scenes of Chinese domestic life, commissioned images of heraldic devices or specific events, as well as naval themes of ships and travel. The European fascination with porcelain led to an intense competition among different countries to replicate Chinese fabrication, which remained a well-guarded secret. Illustrations documenting porcelain-making, of which we see one example here, seemed to show all the steps involved, but of course did not include technical details nor the necessary ingredients, such as kaolin, a soft white clay. Within the visual arts, Castiglione merged traditional Chinese materials, techniques and abstraction with a European sense of heightened physical likeness. Commissioned to paint the emperors' favourite animals, especially horses, foreign tributary gifts, and imperial portraits, Castiglione used his naturalism to accentuate the expression, modeling and spatial depth of the figures, while retaining a traditional composition and looseness of brushwork.

Coda

Matteo Ricci, attributed to Xu Beihong, 1938, ink on paper; photo courtesy of The University of Hong Kong Museum and Art Gallery

The Jesuit influence in China waxed and waned along with the state of diplomatic relations between China, Europe and the Papacy. With the dissolution of their order by the Pope, the Jesuits left China in 1773, but returned after their reinstatement in the 1840s. They continued to support Chinese culture at their seminary founded in Shanghai, introducing there the first systematic teaching of Western art in China. The artists whom they nurtured became major contributors to the Chinese art world, consciously following Castiglione's blending of Eastern and Western traditions. It is in this spirit that Xu Beihong (1895-1953) painted a portrait of Matteo Ricci, for the Ricci Institute at the University of Hong Kong, modeling his own infusion of naturalism into Chinese art on that of Castiglione.