Art symposium illuminates Chinese art

The most important exhibition of Chinese art to come to the United States this century will be enhanced by a symposium on Chinese art sponsored by the University of Chicago and The Art Institute of Chicago.

This international symposium on Chinese Art of the Ming and Ch’ing Dynasties will take place Fri., July 26 through Sun., July 28 in Arthur Rubloff Auditorium at the Art Institute. The speakers at this three-day symposium include leading experts on Chinese painting, calligraphy, material culture and literature.

“Often, when people think of later Chinese art they think of painting, but there is so much more–magnificent palaces and gardens, elegant illustrations of novels and plays, and exquisite jade, ceramic and bronze objects. The symposium will try to capture that rich variety, and will also explore how Chinese art of the period affected and was affected by other things– literature, for instance, and Eurpean art,” says Wu Hung, University of Chicago Harrie A. Vanderstappen Distinguished Service Professor of Chinese Art History, former curator in the Palace Museum in Beijing and the co-organizer of the symposium.

Stephen Little, the other co-organizer of the symposium, is the curator of the exhibition Splendors of Imperial China: Treasures from the National Palace Museum, Taipei, on view at the Art Institute from June 29 through August 25. The exhibition presents some 375 works of art from the National Palace Museum, Taipei, the core of which comprises the former imperial art collection of the Ch’ing dynasty (1644-1911).

For more information, please call the Art Institute at (773) 857-7182. A schedule of speakers is on the reverse.

About the Symposium

All symposium sessions take place in the Arthur Rubloff Auditorium of the Art Institute from July 26 through 28. This auditorium is adjacent to the Art Institute’s Columbus Drive entrance on the museum’s east side. Participants must use the Columbus Drive entrance for the 9:00 morning sessions, which begin before the museum opens to the public. Schedule of Events

Day 1: Friday, July 26

Greetings and Introductory Remarks

9:00 a.m.
Greetings: James Wood, Director and President, The Art Institute of Chicago
Introductory Remarks:
Stephen Little and Wu Hung

Session 1: Imperial Patronage and the Continuity of Style
Discussant: Lothar Ledderose, Heidelberg University

9:15 - 9:55 a.m.
The History of the Imperial Art Collections
Chang Lin-sheng, Deputy Director, National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan 10:00 - 10:40 a.m.
Imperial Engagements with Buddhist Art: Ming Variations in an Old Theme
Marsha Weidner, The University of Kansas, Lawrence 10:45 - 11:25 a.m.
Continuations of Ch’an Painting into Ming-Ch’ing and the Prevalence of Type- images
James Cahill, University of California, Berkeley 11:25 - Noon
Discussant’s Comments and Open Discussion Noon - 2:00 p.m.
Lunch and Viewing of the Exhibition

2:00 - 2:40 p.m.
The Grand Secretary Li Tung-yang as an Arbiter of Visual Culture
Stephen Little, The Art Institute of Chicago 2:45 - 3:25 p.m.
Court Painting out of Bounds: The Spread of Courtly Culture in Fifteenth-Century China
Kathlyn Maurean Liscomb, University of Victoria 3:30 - 4:10 p.m.
Liu Yüan’s “Ling-yen-ko” and “Practices of Reading in Seventeenth-Century
Su-chou” Anne Burkus-Chasson, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign 4:10 - 4:45 p.m.
Discussant’s Comments and Open Discussion Day 2: Saturday, July 27

9:15 - 9:55 a.m.
The Ming Painter Ch’iuYing: Was He a Lacquer Artisan?
Ellen Johnston Laing, Ann Arbor, Michigan 10:00 - 10:40 a.m.
Touch, Gesture, and Presence in the Art of Ch’en Hung-shou
Richard Barnhart, Yale University 10:45 - 11:25 a.m.
‘Dreaming of a Stele:’ Visiting Stelae in the Early Ch’ing and Its Relation to the Stele School of Calligraphy
Qianshen Bai, Western Michigan University 11:25 - Noon
Discussant’s Comments and Open Discussion Noon - 2:00 p.m.
Lunch and Viewing of the Exhibition

2:00 - 2:40 p.m.
Imaginary Collections of Painting in the Late Ming Period: The Work of Art in the Age of Woodblock Reproduction
Craig Clunas, Sussex University, England 2:45 - 3:25 p.m.
Making the Invisible Visible: Images of Desire and the Construction of the Female Body in Ming and Ch’ing Literature, Medicine, and Art
Judith Zeitlin, University of Chicago 3:30 - 4:10 p.m.
The Architecture of the Imagination: The Forbidden City and Pao-yü’s “Dream Journey to the Land of Illusion"
Wu Hung, University of Chicago 4:10 -4:45 p.m.
Discussant’s Comments and Open Discussion

The most important exhibition of Chinese art to come to the United States this century will be enhanced by a symposium on Chinese art sponsored by the University of Chicago and The Art Institute of Chicago.

This international symposium on Chinese Art of the Ming and Ch’ing Dynasties will take place Fri., July 26 through Sun., July 28 in Arthur Rubloff Auditorium at the Art Institute. The speakers at this three-day symposium include leading experts on Chinese painting, calligraphy, material culture and literature.

“Often, when people think of later Chinese art they think of painting, but there is so much more–magnificent palaces and gardens, elegant illustrations of novels and plays, and exquisite jade, ceramic and bronze objects. The symposium will try to capture that rich variety, and will also explore how Chinese art of the period affected and was affected by other things– literature, for instance, and Eurpean art,” says Wu Hung, University of Chicago Harrie A. Vanderstappen Distinguished Service Professor of Chinese Art History, former curator in the Palace Museum in Beijing and the co-organizer of the symposium.

Stephen Little, the other co-organizer of the symposium, is the curator of the exhibition Splendors of Imperial China: Treasures from the National Palace Museum, Taipei, on view at the Art Institute from June 29 through August 25. The exhibition presents some 375 works of art from the National Palace Museum, Taipei, the core of which comprises the former imperial art collection of the Ch’ing dynasty (1644-1911).

For more information, please call the Art Institute at (773) 857-7182. A schedule of speakers is on the reverse.

About the Symposium

All symposium sessions take place in the Arthur Rubloff Auditorium of the Art Institute from July 26 through 28. This auditorium is adjacent to the Art Institute’s Columbus Drive entrance on the museum’s east side. Participants must use the Columbus Drive entrance for the 9:00 morning sessions, which begin before the museum opens to the public. Schedule of Events

Day 1: Friday, July 26

Greetings and Introductory Remarks

9:00 a.m.
Greetings: James Wood, Director and President, The Art Institute of Chicago
Introductory Remarks:
Stephen Little and Wu Hung

Session 1: Imperial Patronage and the Continuity of Style
Discussant: Lothar Ledderose, Heidelberg University

9:15 - 9:55 a.m.
The History of the Imperial Art Collections
Chang Lin-sheng, Deputy Director, National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan 10:00 - 10:40 a.m.
Imperial Engagements with Buddhist Art: Ming Variations in an Old Theme
Marsha Weidner, The University of Kansas, Lawrence 10:45 - 11:25 a.m.
Continuations of Ch’an Painting into Ming-Ch’ing and the Prevalence of Type- images
James Cahill, University of California, Berkeley 11:25 - Noon
Discussant’s Comments and Open Discussion Noon - 2:00 p.m.
Lunch and Viewing of the Exhibition

2:00 - 2:40 p.m.
The Grand Secretary Li Tung-yang as an Arbiter of Visual Culture
Stephen Little, The Art Institute of Chicago 2:45 - 3:25 p.m.
Court Painting out of Bounds: The Spread of Courtly Culture in Fifteenth-Century China
Kathlyn Maurean Liscomb, University of Victoria 3:30 - 4:10 p.m.
Liu Yüan’s “Ling-yen-ko” and “Practices of Reading in Seventeenth-Century
Su-chou” Anne Burkus-Chasson, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign 4:10 - 4:45 p.m.
Discussant’s Comments and Open Discussion Day 2: Saturday, July 27

9:15 - 9:55 a.m.
The Ming Painter Ch’iuYing: Was He a Lacquer Artisan?
Ellen Johnston Laing, Ann Arbor, Michigan 10:00 - 10:40 a.m.
Touch, Gesture, and Presence in the Art of Ch’en Hung-shou
Richard Barnhart, Yale University 10:45 - 11:25 a.m.
‘Dreaming of a Stele:’ Visiting Stelae in the Early Ch’ing and Its Relation to the Stele School of Calligraphy
Qianshen Bai, Western Michigan University 11:25 - Noon
Discussant’s Comments and Open Discussion Noon - 2:00 p.m.
Lunch and Viewing of the Exhibition

2:00 - 2:40 p.m.
Imaginary Collections of Painting in the Late Ming Period: The Work of Art in the Age of Woodblock Reproduction
Craig Clunas, Sussex University, England 2:45 - 3:25 p.m.
Making the Invisible Visible: Images of Desire and the Construction of the Female Body in Ming and Ch’ing Literature, Medicine, and Art
Judith Zeitlin, University of Chicago 3:30 - 4:10 p.m.
The Architecture of the Imagination: The Forbidden City and Pao-yü’s “Dream Journey to the Land of Illusion"
Wu Hung, University of Chicago 4:10 -4:45 p.m.
Discussant’s Comments and Open Discussion

Session 5: Arts of the Ch’ing Court
Discussant: James Watt, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

8:30 - 9:10 a.m.
Late 17th Century French Jesuits and Chinese Lacquer Art
Chou Kung-shin, National Palace Museum, Taipei 9:15 - 9:55 a.m.
In Praise of Self-sounding Bells: The Ch’ien-lung Emperor’s Collection of Elaborate Clocks
Catherine M. Pagani, University of Alabama 10:00 - 10:40 a.m.
On the Relationship Between Chinese Imperial and Folk Decorative Arts from Mid-17th to Mid-18th Century
Chi Jo-hsin, National Palace Museum, Taipei 10:45 - 11:25 a.m.
Archaistic Jades of the Ch’ien-lung Period
Chang Li-tuan, National Palace Museum, Taipei 11:25 - Noon
Discussant’s Comments and Open Discussion Noon - 1:30 p.m.
Lunch and Viewing of the Exhibition

1:30 - 2:10 p.m.
Trompe-l’oeil Paintings in the Forbidden City
Nie Chongzheng, The Palace Museum, Beijing 2:15 - 2:55 p.m.
Visualizing the Subject: Display, Staging, and Portrayal in Late Imperial China
Richard Vinograd, Stanford University 3:00 - 3:40 p.m.
The “Sketched Idea” and Pictorial Meaning in Eighteenth-Century Y’ang Chou
Eugene Wang, University of Chicago 3:45 - 4:25 p.m.
Painting, Visual Culture, and Modernity
Jonathan Hay, Institute of Fine Arts, New York University 4:25 - 5:00 p.m.
Discussants’ Comments and Open Discussion