The Function of the Informal Portraits of the Qing Emperors

INTRODUCTION:

The Chinese imperial portraits were high valued especially the earlier imperial portraits was not only a matter of appreciation but more importantly a claim for legitimate lineage of the dynasty. Some scholars believe that all such formal portraits were intended for family gathering and therefore can be called formal portraits. While they may have been used for some level of informal portraits conformity to the most widely scene showed by Kangxi, costume portrait of the Yongzheng emperor and this hanging scroll during this Qing period. This essay paper tries to discuss the function of informal portraits.

KANGXI INFORMAL PORTRAITS

The Kangxi emperor sought to engage the Chinese cultural world, and the palace collection of calligraphy and painting began to grow through his patronage of the arts. Official portraits for ritual uses as well as informal portraits and depictions of life in the palaces were executed, especially executed paintings employing Western techniques of perspectives and shading.

The greatest painting project of the Kangxi Court was initiated after the Kangxi emperor began making inspection tours to the south. He made a total of six tours during his reign, beginning in 1684, these grand gestures were intended to display the power of the Manchus to the southern populace. It was after the second southern inspection tour (1689) that a series of great handscrolls were planned. They were executed under the direction of Wang Hui (1632-1717), another painter of the Orthodox School, who had positioned himself to receive the appointment. Through this project, the Kangxi emperor took pictorial possession of the heartland of Chinese culture.

This work in one hundred fascicles was completed in 1708 and remains and important reference source this day. These literary projects were perhaps closer to the Kangxi emperor’s heart than his patronage of painters or his collecting activities. This informal portraits painted by a court artist, Kangxi had himself portrayed in the role of a scholar surrounded by books rather than by paintings or objects. The books are depicted using Western perspective, demonstrating the influence of Kangxi’s broad intellectual curiosity on the work of court artists. (Here figure one of Kangxi)

The Qing rulers took care to educate all of their sons so that each might be capable of ruling. In early 18th century, a palace school was established within the inner court. There were also classrooms in several of the Imperial Villas in the Peking suburbs so that instruction would not be interrupted when the emperor and his family moved. The curriculum at the palace school included lessons in the Confucian classics and Manchu and Mongolian language and instruction in riding archery and other military skills. (p.130)

Manchu clothing, Manchu language, and mounted archery became defining makers of the Qing dynasty. Although the language, and mounted archery were requisites only for bannermen, Manchu clothing affected not only banner families but also Han Chine officials, since it was the court dress. From the conquest era, Manchu rulers had identified their distinctive traditional dress as an important component of their power. The fundamental features of Manchu dress echoed the needs of Steppe peoples. Hoods provided insulation for the head from the Cold Northeast Asian winters. Long, tight sleeves indeed in cuffs shaped like horses hooves to protect the back of the hands from the wind. The high collar and asymmetrical closures also protected against the wind, while the slashed openings of the Manchu coat enabled the wearer to move freely on horseback. Trousers, worn by men and women, protected the wearer’s legs from the horse’s flanks and the elements. Boots with rigid soles allowed riders to stand in the iron stirrups, enabling them to shoot with greater force and accuracy.

This portrait was not likely to have been created as an ancestor portrait that it may have been used for informal family veneration of the sitter. (p. 132)

The dress code for bannerwomen forbade from adopting the Chinese custom of foot-binding. Since many Manchu women mode on horseback and engaged in hunting, the crippling resulting from foot-binding was obviously detrimental. They wore three earrings in each year. Although the dress code was not always obeyed-imperial edicts complain of infringements from the middle of the 18th century onward- the portraits indicate that many bannerwomen did follow traditional customs. (132)

Court robes were a variant of Manchu traditional dress. Court clothing evolved from 1636, when Hongtaiji took on a dynamic name and began to model many aspects of his government on Ming precedents. This dress regulation was modified in practice but continued to exist until the end of the end of the dynasty. The colour of the robes and the decorative motifs such as dragons (and the twelve symbols that could adorn only the rulers most formal robes) were dictated by an individuals rank. The essential status boundaries that were defined by colour remained the same. Only the emperor, the empress dowager, Empress, and first-rank consort could wear bright yellow robes; imperial kinsmen wore blue or blue-black robes. Exceptions to the colour regulations were always made for robes conferred by the emperor.

The regulations stating which ranks were permitted to wear clothes adorned with specified types of dragon changed during the dynasty. The right to wear robes decorated with five-clawed dragons was initially restricted to the emperor his sons, and princes of the first and second ranks, but by 1759 only the twelve symbols were reserved for the sole use of the emperor and empress.

The dress code presented three categories of clothing for the court-formal, semi-formal, and informal or ordinary. The categories applied to all princes, courtiers, and officials of sufficiently high rank whose attendance was required at imperial audiences, court assemblies or state sacrifices.

Court dress, the most formal attire, was the most conservative in preserving features distinctive to Manchu national costume worn before the conquest. Not all the ancestor's portraits display splendid court dress at such a high level of formality. Elegant, semiformal robes that fasten on the side called jitu (literally, festive robe), were also frequently depicted.

Informal portraits also show subjects wearing an ordinary dress. The robes were worn by Kangxi in the table and not in public, in reality. However, many more portraits depict their subjects in wearing a dress, because, during the time, dress code exemplifies the power of clothing to convey family and social prestige.

According to Henrietta Harrison during the 18th century, when that view was at its height, the emperor was not

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