Visitors at Dulwich Picture Gallery peer at the Old Masters on the walls, trying to spot the US$185 Chinese replica hung among paintings by Rembrandt, Rubens and Gainsborough on Tuesday.
“I think it’s that one. It’s just looking so pristine,” said Ian Mortimer, 60, from northwest England, pointing at a portrait from 1820 by English painter James Lonsdale. In an audacious move, the London gallery has replaced one of the 270 paintings in its permanent collection with a work knocked-up in a few weeks in a studio in southern China.
Hung among a world-class collection that also includes paintings by Van Dyck, Constable and Canaletto, the goal is to make people re-examine the artworks around them.
Photo: AFP/ Ben Stansall
“It suddenly raises everything to doubt, they have to look around and look at every single picture properly,” said Xavier Bray, chief curator of the Dulwich Picture Gallery.
“When you look at an Old Masters painting you’ve got the varnishes, you’ve got the brushwork, you’ve got the type of canvas that was used, the cracking of the paint.
“This is a Chinese replica that was made this year, so it is pretty obvious when you find it. What’s fascinating is to see it in the museum context.”
Photo: AFP/ Ben Stansall
After Mortimer recorded his choice on the gallery’s iPad, his wife Sue, 59 took her turn, picking a portrait of a woman the other side of the room — mainly “because I loathe it”.
Sue praised the concept, telling AFP: “As soon as you hang something in an art gallery, you presume it’s good. I should be able to say what I think is good.”
But she mused: “If nobody gets it at all, what does that say about what we are looking at?”
Photo: AFP/ Ben Stansall
THROWING DOWN THE GAUNTLET
Not everyone was so enthusiastic. “It’s impossible,” said one regular to the gallery who asked not to be named, and looked rather downbeat at the prospect of having to choose.
“The project is going to destabilize how you feel when you look at a piece of art,” acknowledged Doug Fishbone, the American artist who came up with the idea.
He said his intention was not to fool people but to strip away the certainty that something is worthwhile just because it is in a gilded frame and in an art gallery.
“I’m hoping that it will throw down the gauntlet a bit in terms of giving them a challenge,” Fishbone said, adding that he also hoped it would be fun.
The idea of replicating the work of top painters is nothing new. In the time of Rubens, “if you wanted a copy of his beautiful Venus and Mars, you would just contact his studio... and order one,” Bray noted.
“What we’re doing here is just showing that the practice has now moved to China,” he said.
Millions of replicas are produced every year in China for a global and also domestic market, focused around the studios and workshops in the southern village of Dafen.
The Dulwich replica was ordered from Meisheng Oil Painting Manufacture in Xiamen, in Fujian province. The gallery emailed a jpeg of its chosen picture, paid US$194 including shipping via PayPal, and received the rolled-up replica within three weeks by courier.
It was stretched onto the frame that normally holds the original painting and from Tuesday was hung in its normal place, where it will stay, unannounced, until it is revealed to the public on April 28.
Both Fishbone and Bray praised the quality of the replica, but insist there really is no comparison, as the public will be able to judge when the two are exhibited side by side.
“You’ll be able to compare and contrast how well the person making the replica did, and to appreciate how beautiful the original is,” Bray said.
May 18 to May 24 Pastor Yang Hsu’s (楊煦) congregation was shocked upon seeing the land he chose to build his orphanage. It was surrounded by mountains on three sides, and the only way to access it was to cross a river by foot. The soil was poor due to runoff, and large rocks strewn across the plot prevented much from growing. In addition, there was no running water or electricity. But it was all Yang could afford. He and his Indigenous Atayal wife Lin Feng-ying (林鳳英) had already been caring for 24 orphans in their home, and they were in
On May 2, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫), at a meeting in support of Taipei city councilors at party headquarters, compared President William Lai (賴清德) to Hitler. Chu claimed that unlike any other democracy worldwide in history, no other leader was rooting out opposing parties like Lai and the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). That his statements are wildly inaccurate was not the point. It was a rallying cry, not a history lesson. This was intentional to provoke the international diplomatic community into a response, which was promptly provided. Both the German and Israeli offices issued statements on Facebook
President William Lai (賴清德) yesterday delivered an address marking the first anniversary of his presidency. In the speech, Lai affirmed Taiwan’s global role in technology, trade and security. He announced economic and national security initiatives, and emphasized democratic values and cross-party cooperation. The following is the full text of his speech: Yesterday, outside of Beida Elementary School in New Taipei City’s Sanxia District (三峽), there was a major traffic accident that, sadly, claimed several lives and resulted in multiple injuries. The Executive Yuan immediately formed a task force, and last night I personally visited the victims in hospital. Central government agencies and the
Australia’s ABC last week published a piece on the recall campaign. The article emphasized the divisions in Taiwanese society and blamed the recall for worsening them. It quotes a supporter of the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) as saying “I’m 43 years old, born and raised here, and I’ve never seen the country this divided in my entire life.” Apparently, as an adult, she slept through the post-election violence in 2000 and 2004 by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), the veiled coup threats by the military when Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) became president, the 2006 Red Shirt protests against him ginned up by
RSS