400 pages, jacketed hardback, 291 x 219 mm, over 120 colour illustrations
PRICE: £110.00
ISBN: 978-962-7502-47-0
Chinese literati material finds its way into parts of the brain which regular works of antiquity cannot reach; the convoluted twists of cunning poetic allusions, themselves referring back and further back, to old writings, inscriptions on stone, legendary heroes and their mottoes, and not infrequent misquotes, can catch the unwary seeker after meaning in their complex web, causing him to lose all sense of afternoons and sometimes days. While one can admire Chinese literati works for their purely visual appeal and intimate, personable presence, it is their literary content that renders them so endlessly individual and subjective of interpretation, and one cannot not expect to fully understand and therefore appreciate them without a fair bit of reading. Thus, these beautiful photographs of over 100 works, are accompanied by detailed entries, with translations and discussion of the various threads of meaning.
This exhibition and catalogue celebrates the most gifted, inventive and eccentric amateurs of the 18th and early 19th centuries with a selection of drawings, engravings and portraits gathered from Soane's collection and other museums, archives and private houses around the country. More