Staging Hope: Rethinking Scenes of Everyday Life in East Asian Painting

Session Submission Type: Organized Panel Proposal Application

Abstract

Known as fūzoku-ga or fengsu hua in East Asia, “genre paintings” are broadly defined as non-narrative illustrations of people living and working in their habitats. Consequently, they’ve often been taken as objective representations of the customs and material culture of a certain period. Although they document the past to some extent, the “realities” projected through them are idealized ones which express their patrons’ visions and hopes behind a façade of truthfulness.
Focusing on images of weavers, villagers, the blind, and the aged from 12th- to 18th-century China and Japan, the panel offers new insight into the viewership and cultural significance of genre paintings. Huang argues how images of weavers operating spinning wheels in China symbolize hopes for attaining and remaining in high government office. Bianchi explains how depictions of the blind in 18th-century China satirizes the blinded pursuit of wealth, reflecting hopes for correcting social ills. Tsai postulates how genre painting themes associated with depictions of China’s mythical Demon Queller Zhong Kui reflect the viewers’ aspirations for simple, peaceful lifestyles. Saka argues how Datsueba, a Buddhist folk deity fashioned as an old hag in Pilgrimage Mandalas in Japan, symbolizes the hope for salvation for 16th-century worshippers.
Using literary, historical, and religious texts in the analyses, the panel will be of interest to historians of art, religion, and science, as well as scholars concerned with the value and caveats of using “genre painting” in historical research.

Area of Study

• Northeast Asia

Session Organizer

• Chun-Yi Joyce Tsai, National Taiwan University

Individual Presentations

• Weaving Hopes of Family and Empire: Deciphering the Image of the Spinning Wheel in China - Xiaofeng Huang, Central Academy of Fine Arts, Beijing, China

• Deluded by Fame and Fortune: Images of Blind People in Qing Dynasty Painting - Alice Bianchi, Institut Catholique de Paris, France

• Supernatural Beings in Genre Painting Scenes: Some “Costume Portraits” of the Demon Queller Zhong Kui in China since the 13th Century - Chun-Yi Joyce Tsai, National Taiwan University

• Salvation by the Old Hag Datsueba in the Zenkōji Pilgrimage Mandala - Chihiro Saka, Graduate University for Advanced Studies, Kyoto

Discussant

• Roslyn Lee Hammers, The University of Hong Kong