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December Issue
2008
Columbia Museum
of Art in Columbia, SC, Offers Chinese Art
The Columbia Museum
of Art in Columbia, SC, is privileged to show for the first time,
a major gift to the museum of Chinese art in the exhibition, Eye
to the East: The Turner Collection of Chinese Art. The exhibition
opens on Dec. 19 and will be on view through Feb. 8, 2009.
The donation to the Columbia Museum of Art of this collection
is significant in that it now gives breadth and context to a small,
but strong and growing, collection of Korean, Japanese and Chinese
art. This constitutes the only public collection of Asian art
created for the Asian market in South Carolina. The exhibition
Eye to the East offers visitors a more in-depth understanding
of Chinese art and a more complete study of the outstanding gifts
from Dr. Turner.
Dr. Turner's collection is exceptional in that it covers a broad historical span with excellent examples from many periods. The approximately 70 works in the exhibition range from rare painted ceramics and bronzes of Neolithic times (ca. 8000 - 2000 B.C.) to superb ceramics, vessels, tomb figures and Buddhist sculpture from the Golden Age of China, the Tang dynasty (618-907). Beautiful works from almost every intervening period (Han to Sui dynasties 206 B.C. - A.D. 618, and Jin through Yuan dynasties 906 - 1368) are also included. A highlight of the exhibition is a very rare terracotta figure of the Maitreya - Buddha of the future - from the 7th century Sui/Early Tang Dynasty.
The earliest pieces in the Turner collection are from the Xiajiadian culture that flourished in Northeast China about 2000 B.C. The people of the time built permanent homes, farmed and raised domesticated animals. The two painted Xiajiadian jars in the Turner collection are excellent examples of their work.
Tomb figures in Eye
to the East - guardian figures, chimera and spirited horses
from the
Han and Wei dynasties (206 B.C. - A.D. 534) show the remarkable
skill of the ceramic craftsmen. Also included are stonewares and
porcelains with simple forms and monochromatic glazes from the
Song, Jin and Yuan dynasties (906-1279, 1115-1234, 1279-1368).
The exhibition is organized by the Columbia Museum of Art and guest curated by Donald A. Wood, Ph.D., chief curator, The Virginia and William M. Spencer II Curator of Asian Art at The Birmingham Museum of Art, Birmingham, Alabama.
For further information
check our SC Institutional Gallery listings, call the Museum at
803/799-2810 or visit (www.columbiamuseum.org).
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