Lucien de Guise finds that a splendid exhibition at the British Museum is full of visual treats.
The British Museum doesn’t conceal much from visitors to China’s Hidden Century. As the building is a magnet for regular protests seeking the repatriation of the Parthenon Marbles and Benin Bronzes, it’s hard to escape the “l” word: loot. Halfway through the exhibition there’s a more engaging reminder than most: a painting titled Looty the Chinese Dog. This small hostage was abducted during the destruction of the Summer Palace in 1860. Restitution agitators might consider a detour from Bloomsbury to Buckingham Palace when they spot the label stating “Lent by His Majesty the King”. Nearby are two broken roof tiles from Beijing’s once majestic imperial summer residence. The British Museum is admitting to ownership of one and pinning the other one on the V&A.
There is much to be learnt by look- ing at exhibition lenders’ names. In addition to the big museums such as the Metropolitan in New York and the Palace Museum in Beijing, the lesser spoils have ended up in institutions such as the Prince Albert Memorial Museum in Exeter. It’s a global init-iative. Rightly so, as China was during its “hidden century” the most populous nation on the planet. Recently it has been overtaken by India.
Despite the century (early 19th to early 20th) being a low point for China, the curators have turned this tarnished era into a fascinating account, fabulously displayed. It has been a while since the designers of a British Museum show have pulled off something so full of quietly extravagant connoisseurship. With this comes a sense of dread around every corner; we know the story of the Heavenly Kingdom doesn’t end well. At least the exhibition is over before we join the Long March or the Cultural Revolution.
It’s hard to do justice even to one century out of 70 centuries of civilisation. China is too big and too cultivated to be compressed into a gallery of any size. The curators have taken on the challenge thematically. Every section has visual treats and an abundance of information. There’s some audio too, which is useful for anyone who would like to hear the difference between the Manchu and Chinese languages. Categories include Court, Artists, Military and the more enigmatic “Global Qing”.
Each one sustains you long enough to reach the next stage of the journey. Just as “Court” begins to get a bit repetitive, with outfits that would outshine the recent coronation, you suddenly encounter the reassuring staidness of King George V and Queen Mary. Their photo is dwarfed by the most monstrous knickknacks in the exhibition. The towering pair of cloisonné vases was presented by the last emperor of China for the 1911 UK coronation – just as Puyi was about to lose his throne. It is astonishing that during this time of turmoil, an imper-ial functionary was able to think about what the British royal home might be lacking. It must have been the right choice as the vases have been on disp-lay at Buckingham Palace ever since.
Queen Mary was quite a collector of Chinese art, which is not discussed, but seekers of the female contribution to China’s story will be rewarded. Fortunately it’s not all about footbinding, which is very tastefully handled. There is more than three-inch shoes and the Empress Dowager Cixi to engage with, although it’s hard to escape from her. Being the de facto ruler for almost half a century tells us the stuff Cixi was made of. It seems she was intrigued by the distant empress in London. An unusual painting by a Chinese artist shows Queen Victoria reinterpreted from a British lithograph, with no Looty or any other dog at her side. Cixi was a capable artist, like Victoria, and there are examples of her work. Sadly for most of the other women artists, the patriarchy was against too public a display of their talents.
One of the messages of the exhibition is how integrated China was with the 19th-century world. The rightful sense of superiority that had kept the empire going for so long was beginning to crumble, and there were some destructive rivals. The Opium Wars occasion few moments of national pride for the British, not even the print of a rather impressive opium-storage facility in Patna, India, which would be the envy of any Amazon logistics manager.
In China, the 19th century is still called the “century of humiliation”. On the whole they don’t blame everyone else for their misfortunes. That job can be left to Western art critics. The day before the press preview, the Guardian review started with “how opium and Christianity demolished a civilisation”. There is truth in the drug-dealing accusation, but it was a surprise to see Christianity in the dock. Having studied the progress of foreign religions in East Asia, it’s extraordinary what a small impression the world’s largest religion has made there. It’s a similar situation with Islam, the world’s second-largest religion. Both are mentioned in the exhibition, but what reviewers really want to hear about is the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom.
It’s an unpromising start for a new cult to call itself Christian just because its founder claims to be Christ’s much younger brother. Hong Xiuquan had been influenced by Protestant pamphleteers and then turned into a Revd Jim Jones with much more blood on his hands. The Taipings had their rebellious moment against the Manchu rulers, just as the Muslims did, and a staggering number of lives were lost.
For Christians who followed Christ, rather than Hong Xiuquan, there was still plenty of misery in store. Cathol-ics tended to work better than others with the local population, probably because of their superior education, healthcare and orphanage facilities. This didn’t exempt them from regular displays of popular outrage. In addition to the anti-Christian Boxer Rebellion, there was what is described here as the “Tianjin incident” – more commonly known as the Tianjin Massacre to distinguish it from the 1939 Tientsin Incident involving the Japanese army. In 1870 around 60 Catholics and other Christians were murdered after false rumours had been spread about the ill-treatment of Chinese children by French nuns. The exhibition features a folding fan that commemorated the event.
At least Catholic ecclesiastical text- iles are represented in one showcase. It’s a display that offers so much prom-ise, with a Low Mass set complete with embroidered pall among other items. There’s also a Chinese biretta, long since discarded liturgically – the elusive jijin. Everything is gloriously embroidered with the precision that marks the Qing dynasty. The explanat-ions are less detailed. The counterfeit Christianity of the Taiping rebels takes up much more space and gets an even better display. My award for the must-have outfit in the show would go to the jacket and boots from the court of Hong Xiuquan. The ensemble looms out of the darkness, less like a pastor’s outfit than that of a Buddhist monk gone rogue with the embroidery kit. Like so much in the exhibition it tells a compelling story. With so many stories to tell, however, most are going to remain hidden.
China’s Hidden Century is at the British Museum until October 8.
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