Prosperous Suzhou
{{Short description|Painting by Xu Yang}}
{{Infobox Painting
| title = Prosperous Suzhou
| artist = Xu Yang
| year = 1759{{cite web |title=Prosperous Suzhou (detail) |url=https://www.vam.ac.uk/users/node/19038 |publisher=Victoria and Albert Museum |access-date=November 13, 2013}}
| type = Handscroll; ink and color on silk.
| height_metric = 35.8
| width_metric = 1225
| height_imperial = 14
| width_imperial = 482
| city=Shenyang
| museum=Liaoning Provincial Museum
}}
Prosperous Suzhou ({{zh|t={{linktext|姑蘇|繁華|圖}}|s={{linktext|姑苏|繁华|图}}|p=Gūsū Fánhuá Tú}}), originally entitled Burgeoning Life in a Resplendent Age ({{zh|t={{linktext|盛世|滋生|圖}}|s={{linktext|盛世|滋生|图}}|p=Shèngshì Zīshēng Tú}}), is an 18th-century scroll painting (handscroll) created in 1759 by the Chinese court painter Xu Yang. Depicting the bustling urban life of Suzhou, it combines Western perspective with traditional Chinese style. It measures {{convert|12.25|x|0.36|m|ft|1|abbr=off}}.
History
The Qianlong Emperor commissioned Prosperous Suzhou after he returned from an inspection trip to the south in 1751.{{cite web |title=Paintings depict prosperous cities of Ming and Qing dynasties |url=https://www.info.gov.hk/gia/general/200909/24/P200909240131.htm |publisher=info.gov.hk |date=September 24, 2009 |access-date=November 13, 2013}} It took several years for Xu Yang, a native of Suzhou, to complete. Prosperous Suzhou was renamed from Burgeoning Life in a Resplendent Age in the 1950s.{{cite book |last=Chung |first=Anita |year=2004 |title=Drawing Boundaries: Architectural Images in Qing China |publisher=University of Hawaii Press |isbn=9780824826635}}
Description
{{Wide image|Prosperous Suzhou.jpg|7000px|Prosperous Suzhou by Xu Yang|dir=rtl}}
Prosperous Suzhou is a handscroll, a long narrow scroll for displaying a series of scenes. It is twelve meters in length. It is intended to be viewed starting from the right end, by laying it flat on a table and unrolling it. One admires it section for section during the unrolling as if traveling through a landscape, depicting a continuous journey.Delbanco, Dawn (2008). [https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/chhs/hd_chhs.htm "Chinese Handscrolls"]. In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Retrieved November 13, 2013.
European art and its techniques like linear perspective became increasingly influential in China the 18th and 19th centuries.{{cite web |title=Masterpieces of Chinese Painting 700 - 1900: Challenging the Past and Looking to the West 1600-1900 |url=http://www.vam.ac.uk/users/album/18977 |publisher=Victoria and Albert Museum |access-date=November 13, 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131113230902/http://www.vam.ac.uk/users/album/18977 |archive-date=November 13, 2013 |url-status=dead}} Skillfully composed, Prosperous Suzhou combines Western linear perspective with traditional Chinese compositional devices. The scroll is invaluable from both a historical and an artistic point of view,{{Cite journal | last1 = Hung | first1 = W. C. P. | title = The city so prosperous: Episodes of urban life in Suzhou | doi = 10.1080/136023600419591 | journal = The Journal of Architecture | volume = 5 | issue = 3 | pages = 267–291 | year = 2000 | s2cid = 144160993 }} depicting in intricate detail the mid-18th century topography and customs of Suzhou, allowing modern viewers to visit a Chinese city of 250 years ago.
In his inscription at the end of the scroll, Xu Yang wrote that he painted it in order to depict a peaceful and prosperous reign, and to pay homage to the reign of the Qianlong Emperor.{{cite web |title=Suzhou Scroll |url=http://sites.fas.harvard.edu/~hsa13/scroll/suzhou_viewer.html |publisher=Harvard |access-date=November 13, 2013}} In addition, his inscription describes the scroll as a journey from Mount Lingyan to the city walls of Suzhou, through the city, and ending at Tiger Hill.
The scroll vividly illustrates the visual appearance of the terrain, urban landscapes, and everyday life in an area covering several dozen miles. The middle of the scroll depicts an idealised view of all the activities of the bustling urban center of Suzhou. Viewers can see numerous merchants, traders, barges and passenger boats, as well as dense rows of shops and vendors. More than 4,800 human figures, 2,000 architectural structures, and 400 boats are present.
File:Xu Yang - Women of the village working.jpg|Village women at work
File:Xu Yang - Theatre play.jpg|Theater
File:Xu Yang - Commerce on the water.jpg|Commerce on the water
File:Xu Yang - Examination hall.jpg|Examination hall
File:Xu Yang - Marriage.jpg|Marriage ceremony
File:Tiger Hill and Xu Yang's inscription.jpg|Tiger Hill and Xu Yang's inscription
Exhibitions
Prosperous Suzhou along with fourteen other paintings (all on the subject of the prosperous cities of the Ming dynasty and Qing dynasty) from the Liaoning Provincial Museum were exhibited at the Hong Kong Museum of Art from 25 September 2009 to 22 November 2009 to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China.
The Victoria and Albert Museum in London mounted an exhibition entitled Masterpieces of Chinese Painting that included Prosperous Suzhou from 26 October 2013 to 19 January 2014. The exhibition was organized to display the finest examples of Chinese painting from the beginning of the 8th to the end of the 19th century.
In 2016, a booklet by Michael Nicoll-Griffith was published entitled "Prosperous Suzhou" which displays a painted copy of Xu Yang's original. The booklet includes an explanation in English of pictorial descriptions in each half-metre of the painting.{{Cite book |last=Nicoll-Griffith |first=Michael |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZiumDAEACAAJ |title=Prosperous Suzhou |date=2016-02-27 |publisher=Blurb, Incorporated |isbn=978-1-364-30962-6 |language=en}}
See also
References
External links
{{Commons category|Prosperous Suzhou}}
- [http://sites.fas.harvard.edu/~hsa13/scroll/suzhou_viewer.html Suzhou Scroll], zoomable panoramic viewer depicting details of Prosperous Suzhou.
- {{YouTube|id=VCsAVcTZ2xY|title=Prosperous Suzhou}}, an RTHK segment about the 2009 exhibition of Prosperous Suzhou in Hong Kong.