#artsofasia

Many of our 2021 acquisitions are works and objects that will also add important, new dimensions to our historical collections. Next month, you’ll have the chance to check out the first large-scale Korean Buddhist sculpture to enter our collection, as well as a variety of ritual tools and temple decorations dating from the sixth to nineteenth centuries, coming on view in our brand new gallery looking at the arts of Buddhism. Our larger Arts of Korea collection will also welcome an extensive selection of rare ceramics, calligraphies, wood furnishings, and paintings, including a fascinating copy of a portrait of the artist and art historian Kang Se-Hwang, currently housed in the National Museum of Korea. We’re also at work on the reinstallation of our renowned European collection, which will gain a particularly unique portrait of a well-dressed African man, telling a more inclusive narrative around the presence of Black people in early modern Europe.

This masterpiece of Chinese porcelain is an important example of early blue-and-white ware from the imperially sponsored kilns of Jingdezhen in Jiangxi province. Four fish—mackerel, whitefish, carp, and freshwater perch—are depicted swimming along the hip of the vessel; their Chinese names form a rebus for the phrase “honest and incorruptible” (qingbai lianjie). The visual wordplay suggests that the jar may have been made for an elite clientele who, it was hoped, would be inspired by the rebus’s message of rectitude while drinking their wine. The twisting leaves and stems of the eelgrass, blossoming lotuses, and other flora elegantly frame the fish and evoke the teeming pulse of the ocean. The mineral cobalt for the rich blue color was imported from western Asian sources, and similar porcelains were often made for the Middle Eastern export market.

One of the major themes in the new Arts of China and Arts of Japan galleries is international exchange. Raw materials, precious works of art, and big ideas all traveled the land and sea routes that connected the many cultures of Asia to one another and to the world beyond. From a very early period, far-flung nations adopted one another’s aesthetics, technologies, and beliefs thanks to commercial trade and the work of traveling missionaries. 

This leather trunk, designed to strap onto a mule or camel, probably traveled on the Silk Road, as it was made in eastern China for client with a taste for Central Asian decoration. It is the 13th-century equivalent of designer luggage: most goods on the Silk Routes likely travelled in burlap sacks and wood boxes. We can only speculate about what its contents were: precious goods sent as tribute to a foreign king or important mosque or temple? the dowry of a royal bride? or just the clothes and toiletries of a wealthy merchant? Visit Brooklyn’s new Arts of Asia galleries and discover the cosmopolitanism of Asia’s ports and courts for yourself.

Among the many narratives told in our newly reinstalled #ArtsofJapan galleries is the story of advancements and continuity throughout the country’s ten-thousand-year history of ceramic-making. This dramatic pot is likely the oldest object in the gallery, but by the time it was created in approximately 3000-2000 b.c.e., artisans in Japan had been making fired-clay vessels for at least seven thousand years. By the Middle Jōmon period, potters had excellent control over their materials and could create vessels that were beautiful as well as functional. Now you can see ancient works like this along side contemporary ceramics that represent the cutting edge of ceramic achievement in Japan.

The Lunar New Year, celebrated in many parts of eastern Asia, is a time to wish for good fortune in the year to come. One of the most common emblems of the new year season is the fish, because the word for fish, “yu,” sounds like the word for prosperity (they are written with different characters). The Brooklyn Museum wishes you a healthy and successful new year! We hope spend some of it in our newly reinstalled Arts of Asia galleries.

The Japanese call these mythical beasts “Korean Lions” but the origin of this pairing of guardian animals is more likely Chinese. There is a tradition that the beast with the open mouth is saying “Ah” while the one with the closed mouth is saying “Mm.”  These sounds represent the beginning and end of all things because they are the first and last letters of the ancient Indian language, Sanskrit.  So these Korean lions lived in Japan, but their ancestors were Chinese, and they’re speaking an Indian language. All of this reminds us of how inter-connected Asian cultures were even in a very early period.  For this and other stories of international exchange in Asia, check out the new Arts of Asia galleries. 

The Brooklyn Museum began its focused collecting of Chinese art in 1909, when it received a gift of one of the most important collections of cloisonné outside of China. Over the course of more than a century the Museum has amassed a collection of nearly 1,000 objects spanning more than 5,000 years that reveals the diversity of Chinese art and culture. 

See them on view in our newly reopened Arts of Asia galleries.

We wish you a happy Bunka no hi (Japanese Culture Day), a national holiday in Japan and a great day in any country to celebrate and explore the rich artistic heritage of Japan.