VMPEA: Michael J. Hatch
"Epigraphy, Ruan Yuan, and the Haptic Imagination in Early Nineteenth-Century Chinese Painting"
Michael J. Hatch, PhD, Assistant Professor of East Asian Art History, Department of Art, Miami University
Respondent: Meng Zhao, PhD Candidate, Department of Art History, University of Chicago
The study of ancient cast and inscribed objects among early nineteenth-century literati brought together the senses of vision and touch. Scholars, officials, and artists obsessively documented texts and images found on degraded stone steles or oxidized bronzes. As they did so their brushwork increasingly emulated the effects of aging on these materials. This epigraphic aesthetic bridged media through visual and conceptual languages that were applied as readily to stone and metal inscriptions as they were to paintings and calligraphy. Scholars began to see in terms that were tactile.
Ruan Yuan (1764–1849), one of the early nineteenth-century’s most influential government officials and scholars, was central to this. His essays, “The Northern and Southern Schools of Calligraphy,” and “Northern Steles, Southern Letters,” provide the clearest articulation of the values at the core of the epigraphic aesthetic. Likewise, paintings, inkstones, and rubbings produced within his broad network of friends and aides attest to the manifestation of an early nineteenth-century haptic imagination across media.
This paper is excerpted from the speaker’s book manuscript, The Senses of Painting in China, 1790-1840, a sensory history that explores the appeals to embodied memory made in early nineteenth-century literati painting through allusions to touch, sound, and smell.
Refreshments and a catered dinner will be provided
This event is sponsored by the University of Chicago Center for East Asian Studies with support from a Title VI National Resource Center Grant from the United States Department of Education.
Persons with concerns regarding accessibility please contact Zhenru Zhou (zhenru@zhenruzhou.com) and Yin Wu (yinwu@uchicago.edu).
About VMPEA: The Visual and Material Perspectives on East Asia Workshop is oriented toward the study of visual and material objects, built environments, and the relationship between text and image from East Asia. It explores a plethora of visual and textual materials across a variety of historical periods and geographic locations in order to understand socio-political, cultural, and historical aspects of China, Japan, and Korea. While being based in art history, the Workshop is committed to interdisciplinary inquiries and perspectives, including but not limited to archaeology, anthropology, architecture, literature, religion studies, cinema and media studies, and museum studies. With visual evidence as the basis of our inquiries, our workshops are opportunities for collaborative examination and discussion of these vital materials. As such, we offer speakers the opportunity for open-ended exploration and discussions of the presented materials, in addition to the traditional formats of pre-circulating papers and respondents. This kind of collaborative “thinking through materials” is crucial to visual and object-based study, and we are renowned even among scholars outside of the University for our rigorous discussion sessions. While the Workshop invites outside speakers as an opportunity to encourage intellectual exchanges between students and established scholars, graduate students from the University are prioritized in our program. Recent visitors have included Stanley Abe, Zhang Jianyu, Huiping Pang, Yukio Lippit, Corey Byrnes, Deng Fei, Noriko Murai. In addition, the Workshop is a forum for joint-workshops, interdisciplinary and cultural events related to East Asian topics.