Oftentimes, museum exhibits downplay the importance of the collector, ignoring the romance between the appreciator and the art and any sacrifices that go along with it. Since the 19th century, the Weng family has compiled an extraordinary collection of scholarly Chinese paintings, 30 of which are on view at the MFA in Boston in the exhibit "Through Six Generations: The Weng Collection of Chinese Painting and Calligraphy" through Aug. 1.
Throughout the show, which spans two different galleries and includes two short films, hang works by some of the most influential Chinese artists, such as Dong Qichang and Wang Yuanqi, examples of calligraphy, poetry and portraiture, painting a comprehensive picture of Chinese tradition and the values instilled in the Weng family.
The exhibit opens with the history of the originator of the collection Weng Tonghe, who, having placed first in the 1856 civil service examination, was highly influential in the government. His impressive intellect allowed him to serve as a tutor for two emperors, and his knowledge of art and history established reliability in his artistic eye, incorporating aesthetics, philosophy and cultural tradition. The wall text explains that the collection has since passed through the Weng family to Weng Tonghe's great-great-grandson, Wan-go Weng (born 1918), who brought it to the United States in 1948 for safe-keeping.
Scholarly painting in China gained a new set of principles in the 17th century under the influence of Dong Qichang, the so-called "literati" style's foremost advocate. The style involves subtlety, control, refined brushstrokes and a straying from the bright colors and thickly applied paint of court paintings. Categorized under the "Orthodox School," Dong Qichang's "Pavilion under Pine Trees in Autumn" (1621) epitomizes the elegance and serenity of the style, with a prominence of blank space, the paper being as much a part of the piece as the ink painted on it. Though there are different levels of abstraction within each work, the emphasis of such pieces is on the overall sensation rather than small details, evoking pensiveness and emotion.
In one of the films, made for the exhibit, 88-year-old Wan-go Weng discusses Wang Hui's "Ten Thousand Li Up the Yangtze River" (1699), a work which embodies the intimacy of this exhibit. Its display invites close study, as viewers admire it in near solitude, where it is laid out in a dimly lit room, rolled out to its full length of over 50 ft. Laid flat within a case, visitors can lean down to the hand scroll as if studying it on a private table. The museum has even placed benches in front of the work, encouraging patience and respect for a piece that according to wall text, cost Weng Tonghe more than his annual salary. His admiration and love for this extensive view of the Yangtze River is understandable - rugged cliffs painted with nearly pointillist brushstrokes rise upwards, while tiny figures assert the painting's horizontality, traveling across as the viewer's eye travels, enhancing the massive scale of wavelike mountains. The museum has managed to maintain an element of intimacy meant for a piece like this, despite the public setting.
The entire show has been finely devised around an educational intention, and as viewers our appreciation for the work builds as we see the Chinese tradition through the Weng collectors' eyes and heart. We find that these are pieces that can be enjoyed on a purely aesthetic level, with their dynamic compositions that push upward out of their narrow spaces and flow across their pages, having an easy beauty that overwhelms without the history, needing no translation.
What brings us strikingly close to the collection is the room devoted entirely to the original work of the Weng family. Study truly becomes practice here, and allows the museum setting to transcend its glass cases, establishing clear evidence of inspiration and application of art appreciation.
Weng Tonghe, who had been introduced as a brilliant man with fine taste, speaks in his true nature through his "One-Stroke Calligraphy of the Character Tiger, Hu" (1890), in which the turbulence and movement of his bold stroke asserts his status as one of the greatest calligraphers of his time with greater force and energy than any caption could describe.
This man remains alive through his work, through his "colophons" (commentary on pieces in the collection), his search for meaning and metaphor in art, and gentle character sensitivity and humility as exposed through diaries and paintings. This room embodies the concept of collection as Wan-go Weng puts it in the final film: "You think that you possess the art, but it is really the art that is possessing you."
Upon looking at Yun Shouping's delicate landscape paintings, Weng Tonghe wrote, "Tomorrow will be business as usual - I will be just another vulgar fellow. I am not worthy to see this painting." As visitors to this impressive collection, we are left with the same sentiment, encouraged to be inspired, awed and curious about the traditions seen within these galleries, and to look at art with the love and devotion of such caring collectors as the Weng family.
