“Portrait of the Qianlong Emperor” (detail), Qianlong Period (1736-95), Palace Museum, Beijing
It’s Asia Week in New York and Qianlong Week on CultureGrrl. Having just posted about the over-the-top price at Sotheby’s for what bidders apparently believed to be a Qianlong vase, let’s wander crosstown to the Metropolitan Museum’s exhibition of over-the-top objects, The Emperor’s Private Paradise: Treasures from the Forbidden City (to May 1).
We’ll conclude this journey with a CultureGrrl Video starring Bonnie Burnham, president of the World Monuments Fund (WMF), the preservationist organization that, in a sense, provided the impetus for the one-time tour of the Qianlong Emperor’s luxury goods. They have never before been publicly seen and are unlikely ever to leave the Forbidden City again.
Last October, when I was in Beijing as part of a general-interest (not art-oriented) tour of China, I was aware that I was seeing just a small fraction of the buildings in the Forbidden City, the sprawling compound of courtyards and buildings for China’s imperial rulers.
With a few exceptions, what I did see were façades, not interiors:
I also knew that I was seeing a very small sampling of the Forbidden City’s vast cultural riches. Here’s one of the pieces that I did get to admire:
Octagonal Case with Gem-Inlaid Gold and Openwork Floral Design, Qing Dynasty (1644-1911), on view in the Forbidden City
I did briefly enter the world of the Qianlong Emperor, whose furnishings and decorative objects commissioned for his two-acre, 27-building Qianlong Garden (in the northeast corner of the Forbidden City) are the subject of the 90-object exhibition now at the Met.
My tour group paused at the Qianlong Emperor’s Terrace for Gathering Dew:
We marveled at the astonishing forms of one of his five weirdly marvelous rockeries:
Described by the Met as “one of China’s most extravagant monarchs,” the Qianlong Emperor never actually used the sumptuous hideaway that he had meticulously designed as a retirement retreat.
On its website for the show (linked at the top), the Met examined the extravagance:
The
costliest materials, including rare woods, semiprecious stones,
cloisonné, gilt bronze, porcelain, and lacquer were employed to ornament
every surface of this world….The space remained a virtual time capsule relatively untouched
since imperial times.
An accomplished poet and calligrapher, the Qianlong Emperor was an eclectic aesthete who, from the evidence of the Met’s show, favored designs and materials that pushed the limits of opulence and ornamentation.
For the most part, the use of widely varied materials and complicated forms avoid crass ostentation through exquisite craftsmanship. But I’m not so sure about the eccentric furnishings below. “You’re going to love these!” exclaimed the Met’s curator, Maxwell Hearn (who will be promoted to curator in charge of the Department of Asian Art on July 1, upon retirement of department chairman James Watt). For me, this user-unfriendly ensemble crossed the line from inventively unusual to outlandishly grotesque:
The monarch’s European-influenced tastes extended to intricately embellished decorative objects. After yesterday’s astonishing $18-million price for a vase that Sotheby’s had catalogued as probably 20th century (but that many bidders apparently believed was Qianlong), we should linger to gaze at this striking example:
Vase, Qianlong Period (1736-95), porcelain and malachite glaze, Palace Museum, Beijing
Here’s how this elaborate ceramic was described in the museum’s label:
This lavishly decorated vase features a realistically rendered sash tied at the ends. Its trompe-l’oeil accuracy rivals that of European murals painted according to the rules of mathematical perspective.
Burnham of the WMF, chatting with me at the press preview, provided some background on the genesis of the exhibition. Her organization was looking for a way to get involved in China, and settled upon the massive undertaking of restoring the Qianlong Garden’s buildings and their contents.
While this work (begun in 2001, not to be completed until 2018) was in progress, a delegation from China visited the U.S. to see how museums here present Chinese material. As Bonniea told me, these visitors “loved the Peabody Essex Museum,” Salem, MA, whose curator, Nancy Berliner, organized the show now at the Met. It will later travel for a three-month stint at the Milwaukee Art Museum (June 11-Sept. 11).
My CultureGrrl Video of Burnham was shot at the end of the exhibition, in front of this massive piece:
Throne surround screen and display case, throne and footstool, Qianlong Period (1736-95), from the purple sandalwood and cedar, Palace Museum, Beijing
As you will hear Bonnie tell me, the first pavilion restored by the WMF, Juanqinzhai (Studio of Exhaustion from Diligent Service) is already open to the public on a limited basis. Afterwards, Henry Ng, executive director of the WMF, told me exactly how you can arrange your visit. (If only I had known about this in October!):
The outdoor areas of the first two courtyards of the Qianlong Garden are open to members of the public who purchase tickets to the Treasure Hall (special ticket required), along with the purchase of a general-admission ticket to the Forbidden City. There are two noteworthy pavilions in the first courtyard: the Pavilion of the Purification Ceremony and the Bower of the Ancient Catalpa, which is adjacent to a tree that existed on the site before the Garden was built.
Requests for tours of the interior of Juanqinzhai can be made by writing to:
Central Museum Office—Office of the Director
Gugong Yuan Ban Gong Shi
The Palace Museum
4 Jingshan Qianjie
Beijing, China 100009
Now that you’ve taken care of your travel arrangements, here’s my conversation with Bonnie: