Twelve-panel screen depicting “Spring Morning in the Han Palace” with inscription; encomium on the reverse
date: label: Date
content: Mid-summer (May-June), 1672 (renzi [year] zhongxia [mid-summer]
label: Period
content: Qing dynasty, Kangxi reign
name: label: Artist
content: Sheng Nian 盛年 (active 17th century) painted the template followed by lacquer specialists
notes: label: Description
content: Coromandel screen in twelve sections. Depicits 166 figures and has an inscription with 3 seals. The back covered with inscription.Two seals. Decoration: inlaid in colored lacquers and gold.
label: Marks
content: Three seals on the inscription on the pictorial face of the screen: 1. Sheng Nian 盛 年 2. dayou shi 大有氏 3. wumensanren 吳門散人。 Sheng Nian is intaglio and the other two are relief. Wumensanren is an oval shaped seal at the right of the inscription and the other two are squares below the signature line on the left.
label: Inscriptions
content: An inscription in the upper right corner of the first panel identifies the theme as "Hangong chunxiao ("Spring Morning in the Palaces of Han") and gives the date, second month of Summer in the "renzi" year of the Kangxi period (i.e., May 27-June 24, 1672). A considerably longer inscription covering the entire reverse surface of the twelve panels records that the screen was commissioned as a gift by Huang Jingji in 1672.
label: Label
content: Titled Spring Morning in the Han Palace, this carved polychrome lacquer, or kuancai, screen was made in China in 1672. The scene unfolds from right to left, showcasing imperial ladies, their young sons, and servants living in the sequestered women’s quarters of an imaginary Han dynasty (206 BCE–220 CE) palace. However, the architecture and material culture depicted draw on features from many eras, including the period during which the screen was made.
label: Label
content: Artists decorated this screen by carving the design into a black lacquer surface and filling the voids with bright colors and gilding to create a dramatic polychrome effect. This Chinese technique of lacquer work is known as kuancai (pronounced “kwan tsai”). By the seventeenth century, it was a popular method for making grand screens commissioned as gifts to honor and flatter a male recipient. The screens were displayed in Chinese homes and often paired with elegant hardwood chairs, such as those on display here.
label: Label
content: In the 1670s, when kuancai polychrome screens were newly fashionable in China, Europeans began what would become a long tradition of importing them as luxuries. Traders routed the screens through ports along the southeast Coromandel Coast of India and via Banten on Java, Indonesia. This gave rise to the misbegotten names “Coromandel screens” and “Bantam work,” both of which have obscured the true source of the screens and have erroneously created the impression they were primarily made as export goods. By rejecting the common English names and returning to the Chinese word kuancai, this exhibition focuses attention on the screens’ origin and significance in China.
label: Provenance
content: 1672-?
label: Provenance
content: Kong Yiweng 孔翊翁 [1]
label: Provenance
content: ?-1906
label: Provenance
content: Bunkio Matsuki (1867-1940), method of acquisition unknown [2]
label: Provenance
content: 1906
label: Provenance
content: Sale, New York, American Art Association, "Arms and armor of old Japan" February 8-10, 1906, lot 30 [3]
label: Provenance
content: 1906-1920
label: Provenance
content: Charles Lang Freer, purchased at American Art Association sale [4]
label: Provenance
content: 1920
label: Provenance
content: Freer Gallery of Art, gift of Charles Lang Freer [5]
label: Provenance
content: Notes:
label: Provenance
content: [1] According to the inscriptions on the screen, the work was made for Kong Yiweng
label: Provenance
content: 孔翊翁, a sobriquet for a man identified as Kong Zhenlai 孔貞來. He was a descendent of Confucius and served in the Qing dynasty as a government official with service in both military and civil posts. Yunan was one of many provinces in which he served. Huang Jingji, a fellow townsman and admirer of Kong Yiweng, wrote the encomium on the reverse of the screen. It is plausible that Huang Jingji was involved in the commission to create the screen to present as a gift to Kong, likely for an advanced-age birthday. It is unclear if the screen was made as a gift from only Huang, or more likely from several unnamed people.
label: Provenance
content: [2] A former Buddhist monk, Matsuki Bunkio (1867-1940) moved to the United States in 1888 and settled near Boston and restyled himself as Bunkio Matsuki. He became a dealer in Japanese antiquities, opening a gallery along Boston's fashionable Boylston Street. See note 1.
label: Provenance
content: [3] See American Art Association, "Arms and Armor of Old Japan" [auction catalogue] (New York, February 8-10, 1906), lot 304. The object is described as "A superb work of art, incomparable in its importance. It was executed in 1672 (11th year of Kang- Hi) [sic; should be Kang-hsi] as a gift to the imperial Prince Yoku-wo-ko [sic; in Chinese Kong Yiweng, and he was not a prince], from his friends and admirers on his return to the capital from the governorship of the Province of Un-nan [Yunan]."
label: Provenance
content: [4] See voucher No. 12, where the object is described as "One Chinese Palace Screen, 12 fold, No. 304 of Matsuki Catalogue of 1906," from Box 114, Folder 2, Charles Lang Freer Papers, Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery Archives, Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC, copy in object file.
label: Provenance
content: [5] The original deed of Charles Lang Freer's gift was signed in 1906. The collection was received in 1920 upon the completion of the Freer Gallery.
label: Provenance
content: Research completed on August 11, 2022.
label: Collection
content: Freer Gallery of Art Collection
label: Exhibition History
content: Palace Life Unfolds: Conserving a Chinese Lacquer Screen (July 15, 2023 to January 28, 2024)
label: Exhibition History
content: Bicentennial Exhibition: Chinese Art (December 5, 1975 to November 10, 1976)
label: Exhibition History
content: Chinese Art (January 1, 1963 to March 6, 1981)
label: Previous custodian or owner
content: Bunkio Matsuki 松木文恭 (1867-1940) (C.L. Freer source)
label: Previous custodian or owner
content: Charles Lang Freer (1854-1919)
label: Previous custodian or owner
content: Kong Yiweng 孔翊翁
place: label: Origin
content: China
topic: label: Topic
content: embroidering
label: Topic
content: lacquering
label: Topic
content: lacquer
label: Topic
content: deer
label: Topic
content: dancing
label: Topic
content: Qing dynasty (1644 - 1911)
label: Topic
content: Kangxi reign (1662 - 1722)
label: Topic
content: qin
label: Topic
content: boat
label: Topic
content: architecture
label: Topic
content: fungus-of-immortality
label: Topic
content: China
label: Topic
content: flower viewing
label: Topic
content: mirror
label: Topic
content: musician
label: Topic
content: Chinese Art
label: Topic
content: equestrian
label: Topic
content: Charles Lang Freer collection
label: Topic
content: kuancai
label: Topic
content: Coromandel
setName: label: See more items in
content: Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery Collection
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Gift of Charles Lang Freer
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery
identifier: label: Accession Number
content: F1906.42a-l
objectType: label: Type
content: Furniture and Furnishing
objectRights: label: Restrictions & Rights
content: CC0
physicalDescription: label: Medium
content: Black lacquer on prepared wooden core; carved recesses filled with polychrome pigments and gold (kuancai)
label: Dimensions
content: H x W x D: 216.5 x 50.1 x 606.5 cm (85 1/4 x 19 3/4 x 238 3/4 in)