Save
Save chapter to my Bookmarks
Cite
Cite this chapter
Print this chapter
Share
Share a link to this chapter
Free
Description: Early Chinese Jades in the Harvard Art Museums
The idea for a history of early Chinese jades came to me when I began to delve into the exceptional and complementary collections of the Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, soon after I arrived there as a curator in 1990. Thomas Lentz, then the galleries’ deputy director, supported the project from the...
PublisherHarvard Art Museums
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00041.003
View chapters with similar subject tags
Preface and Acknowledgments
The idea for a history of early Chinese jades came to me when I began to delve into the exceptional and complementary collections of the Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, soon after I arrived there as a curator in 1990. Thomas Lentz, then the galleries’ deputy director, supported the project from the outset, but more than two decades later, a publication based on the Freer|Sackler collections has not materialized. Instead, with Tom’s unfailing encouragement in his later role as director of the Harvard Art Museums, I have written a book that, while grounded in the knowledge I gained by working with the Freer|Sackler collections, is centered on another outstanding collection of Chinese jades: Harvard’s Grenville L. Winthrop Collection. Tom’s confidence and trust in me throughout this period were essential to the completion of the volume before you.
The extended gestation has given me a chance to appreciate just how monumental a task Max Loehr faced with his 1975 catalogue of the Winthrop Collection, a now seminal text in the scholarship on early jades. It has also allowed for an overwhelming wealth of archaeological evidence to surface over the last few decades, providing crucial information unavailable to Loehr when he was writing in the early 1970s. The intense scholarly engagement that resulted—not only from increased access to archaeological and museum collections, but also from a spate of new publications in China focused on recent discoveries—has provided a solid foundation for the present volume; at the same time, it has revealed the pros and cons of different approaches toward understanding Chinese jades.
My primary aim with this book has never been simply to update Loehr’s 1975 catalogue. If that were the case, a very thin volume indeed would emerge. My goal is to present a holistic account of the historical development of one of China’s longest lasting art forms and to provide a broad framework for a variety of investigative methodologies across disciplines. Field archaeological methods together with the research of art historians, historians, anthropologists, epigraphers, mineralogists, and conservation scientists, among others, suggest different ways to look at and think about early Chinese jades. By applying the fruits of their research within a contextualized approach, I hope to uncover the wider spiritual, social, political, cultural, technical, and artistic forces behind China’s early jade production.
The ensuing chapters focus on reconstructing the story of jade’s multifaceted role and its transformation in China’s early history, from its initial appearance in the fifth millennium through the end of the first millennium bce. In this effort, the contributions of mineralogists and conservation scientists are paramount, with the merits of their work most evident in chapters 1 through 3. Rather than relegating “technical studies” to the end of the volume (as most publications do), I have situated them at the beginning to stress the fundamental impact of material and technical issues in our understanding of early Chinese jades, an approach that has been embraced to positive effect in the study of another early Chinese art form, ritual bronzes.
The focus on jade’s early history coincides with the scope of the Winthrop Collection. Among the nearly 700 jades in his collection, more than half date to the first millennium bce alone—a result no doubt of Winthrop’s personal taste combined with what was available through dealers. This emphasis on early material means that the developments of the next two thousand years can be sketched only roughly in the final chapter of the volume. This later history should be explored using the almost 300 jades in the Ernest H. and Helen Pratt Dane Collection, another important body of material presented to Harvard, in 1942. It is my ardent hope that a volume on the Dane Collection will appear to offer a complete picture of the remarkable scope of Chinese jades available at Harvard.
Since Loehr’s 1975 publication already provides a near-comprehensive catalogue of the Winthrop Collection, I have selected just 102 objects for in-depth examination. Moreover, I have attempted to avoid presenting each object as an individual work of art, a common yet flawed practice among most catalogues of jade collections. Instead, I work to position them as they were in antiquity: that is, as components of larger groups within different categories—“to reduce the isolation of individual ‘masterpieces,’ to illuminate the conditions of their making, [and] to disclose the history of their appropriation.”1 Stephen Greenblatt, “Resonance and Wonder, Exhibiting Cultures: The Poetics and Politics of Museum Display”; as cited in Lawton and Lentz 1998: 107. Many ritual bronzes are now understood this way thanks to the groundwork laid by Jessica Rawson, and this approach is even more appropriate for early jades. There are certainly masterpieces to be found in this volume (cats. 1, 5a, 13, 19c, 2426, 32, 38, 39b, 4142, 46), exemplifying rare heights of artistic creativity and workmanship in their periods; there are also objects of interest that may stir controversy and challenge connoisseurship (cats. 2, 5b, 22, 34, 43, 44, 49) and that, under different stewardship, might have been omitted.
An additional goal of mine is to demonstrate the pedagogical and research potential of unprovenanced artifacts—particularly those found in excellent university collections such as Harvard’s—and to highlight their immense potential for serious scholarship and the training of new generations of art historians. This should, I hope, validate Winthrop’s decision to present his collection to a university rather than to a major public institution such as the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., so that “[it] may prove for generations to become a benefit to students of art and lovers of beauty.”2 Extract from Winthrop’s letter to the president of Harvard University, May 24, 1937; quoted in Wolohojian 2003: 46.
I am indebted to far too many individuals throughout my studies, research, and writing for me to acknowledge each here by name. Now-prevailing political conditions in China have encouraged robust scholarly exchange and have opened many doors and opportunities not available before. The generous sharing of time, information, and insights of field archaeologists and archaeological institutes during my many research trips in China have supplied much important data. Museum curators in Western institutions who have provided virtually unlimited access to their collections and object records have added significantly to my firsthand grasp of the material and how these collections were formed in the early 20th century. The specific individuals named here represent merely the tip of the iceberg: my mentor Max Loehr, who taught me the importance of looking carefully and thinking critically about what I saw; the Freer|Sackler Galleries, especially Collections Management staff who tirelessly opened storage cases for me, and Christine Lee, a docent who was my assistant for nearly a decade; archaeologists in China, some now retired or deceased, who gave access to their sites and field discoveries, including Cao Wei and Liu Yunhui (Xi’an-Hancheng); Gong Liang and Li Zebin (Nanjing-Dayunshan); Guo Dashun (Niuheliang); Li Yinde (Xuzhou); Mai Yinghao (Nanyue-Guangzhou); Mou Yongkang (Liangzhu-Yuhang); Wang Jichao and Zhang Changping (Panlongcheng-Suizhou); and Zhang Jingguo (Lingjiatan-Chaohu); curators (some now retired) of major jade collections, including Terese Bartholomew and He Li (Asian Art Museum of San Francisco), Huang Xuanpei (Shanghai Museum), James Lin (Fitzwilliam Museum, University of Cambridge), Colin Mackenzie (formerly Nelson-Atkins Museum), Carol Michaelson (The British Museum), Eleanor Pearlstein (Art Institute of Chicago), Shen Chen (Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto), Ming Wilson (Victoria and Albert Museum), and Xu Xiaodong and Zhang Guangwen (Palace Museum, Beijing); a multitude of early China scholars, especially Lothar von Falkenhausen (UCLA), for his inspiring breadth and command of issues in early Chinese studies; Hayashi Minao (Kyoto), whose detailed approach to data collection and presentation greatly facilitated my research; Li Ling (Peking University), a model of untiring inquiry and rigorous scholarship; Jessica Rawson (Oxford University), whose provocative ideas about bronze assemblages and exchange between ancient cultures have inspired some of mine; Teng Shu-p’ing (Taipei National Palace Museum), who showed me the benefits and pitfalls of early jade scholarship; and Wen Guang (Institute of Geology, Chinese Academy of Geological Science, Beijing), who opened my mind to the importance of mineralogy in the study of jade; students in the Department of Fine Arts, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, from whom I learned a great deal as their dissertation advisor; private collectors in Hong Kong and elsewhere, personifications of passion, commitment, and my sources for information on many worldly-wise “tricks of the trade”; generous supporters throughout these decades, beginning with the E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation for my initial research on the Freer|Sackler collections, the Harvard-Yenching Institute for making it possible for me to spend an entire semester at Harvard to review the Winthrop Collection, and The Chinese University of Hong Kong and counterparts in China and abroad for facilitating my research leave and participation in academic conferences.
For their assistance in making this volume a reality, my appreciation goes to curators and staff at the Harvard Art Museums, including Susanne Ebbinghaus, the George M.A. Hanfmann Curator of Ancient Art and head of the Division of Asian and Mediterranean Art, and her colleagues Amy Brauer, Melissa Moy, Rachel Saunders, and Yan Yang; Francine Flynn in Collections Management; Lian Bruno, Katya Kallsen, Natalja Kent, and Katie Kujala in the Department of Digital Imaging and Visual Resources; Micah Buis and Zak Jensen in the editorial and design departments; and the conservators and scientists of the Straus Center, particularly Angela Chang and Katherine Eremin, for their contribution to this volume (chapter 2) and for making my study visits exciting, enjoyable, and rewarding. Matthew Rogan, curatorial assistant for special exhibitions and publications, deserves singular recognition for his seamless coordination and navigation among different departments and their staff, and for his efforts to keep me on schedule. For their patient and meticulous reading of my manuscript through all editorial stages, appreciation goes to Micah Buis and John Stevenson as well as to Chu Xin for compiling the Chinese glossary and bibliography and for completing the editing and proofreading of all Chinese components. If the text reads well, credit goes to Micah and John; the problems and mistakes come from me. Finally, I wish to thank the team at Lucia|Marquand, including Melissa Duffes, Tom Eykemans, and Adrian Lucia, for all their assistance in the production of this book.
Jenny F. So
Professor Emerita, Department of Fine Arts, The Chinese University of Hong Kong; former Senior Curator of Ancient Chinese Art, Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, Smithsonian Institution
January 2018
Notes
 
1      Stephen Greenblatt, “Resonance and Wonder, Exhibiting Cultures: The Poetics and Politics of Museum Display”; as cited in Lawton and Lentz 1998: 107. »
2      Extract from Winthrop’s letter to the president of Harvard University, May 24, 1937; quoted in Wolohojian 2003: 46. »
Preface and Acknowledgments
Previous chapter Next chapter