Five-colored Parakeet on a Blossoming Apricot Tree

Brief Identification

"Five-colored Parakeet on a Blossoming Apricot Tree" currently housed at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts.

This painting is from the Northern Song capital of Bainlaing and is attributed as a work of the last Song Emperor, Huizong (ruled from 1100–1125CE) as it bears his signature, yet there is debate among art historians about whether or not is was truly created by the emperor . It is dated to around the 1100s CE as part of the Northern Song elite art movement . The painting depicts, as the title suggests, a parakeet comprised of five colors on a branch of a apricot tree that is blooming, both of which are native to China. To the left of the parakeet is a poem written in the traditional calligraphic Chinese script. The purpose that the painting serves is to exemplify the refinement of elite society and the courtly tradition of elites producing art and calligraphy. The medium is of "ink and color on silk" and is 21" x 49 1/4" in size. The work is currently located in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts after it was bought for $11,000 USD on March 2, 1933 from the Yamanaka Co.

Technical Evaluation

The painting was made by using a brush made of hair to draw with ink and pigments onto a piece of silk in the style of calligraphy. The calligraphy was done in the "slender gold" script (shoujin ti), which developed from the calligraphy of Xueji (648 -718 CE) that was studied by Emperor Huizong. Therefore, this calligraphy style of Emperor Huizong was part of the wider artistic development of Chinese calligraphy and painting as part of the cutting edge. As the Emperor was the most likely artist of the piece, it was very easy for him to have access to the lavish medium of silk, especially since the silk, pigments, and ink are all of Chinese origin.

"Five-colored Parakeet on a Blossoming Apricot Tree" has an extensive provenience that stretches from Emperor Wenzong in the Yuan Dynasty and was passed down among the Chinese emperors until it was acquired by the Japanese company, Yamanaka, and was eventually sold to the Boston Museum of Fine Arts in 1933 (as discussed above).

Close view of parakeet on "Five-colored Parakeet on a Blossoming Apricot Tree". From this, one can tell that the parakeet is in fact comprised of five colors.

Local Historical Context

The Song Dynasty in which the was at the time of Emperor Huizong the "richest and most advanced country in the world" and boasted around one million subjects [Ebrey, 2014, xi]. Compared with other Song Emperors, Huizong placed the greatest attention to the arts, at the expense of foreign policy and the internal mechanisms of running the country. During Huizong's reign, the Hanlin Painting Academy became the leading center for painting and calligraphic education. Huizong used the emphasis on painting and the arts to further the unification of China after the Five Dynasties Period by establishing a common expression through the arts. The society was led by the emperor at the top of the social hierarchy followed by hereditary aristocrats and the educated civil servants. The majority of the population of the Song Dynasty population were farmers, like most major civilizations. There was also a sizable population of learned elite that practiced civil service as well as "the refined arts" of poetry, calligraphy, painting, as well as music [Ebrey, 2014, 8].

Close up view of the calligraphy on "Five-colored Parakeet on a Blossoming Apricot Tree". The author of this webpage has been unable to find a translation of the assumed poem.

As the artifact was created by the Emperor, Huizong created the painting in order to express to the elite class what he expected of them and his idea of how art should serve the state and as a pass time. The elite classes were intended to both praise and emulate Huizong through their art.

Aside from the arts, Huizong neglected his duties as emperor and is commonly thought of as having brought the end of his dynasty. Instead of paying attention to the consolidation of the Jurchen peoples in the northern reaches of the Manchuria area of modern day China, Huizong devoted his reign to expanding the arts. From this, the Jurchen were able to invade the Northern Song Dynasty and capture the capital and Huizong and take the emperor captive thus bringing about the end of the Song Dynasty [Ebrey, 2014, 449].

World-Historical Significance

"Five-colored Parakeet on Blossoming Apricot Tree" is significant in world history due to the shift that it represents in Northern Song bureaucracy and culture in that the painting is a tangible example of the civil service exam system and emphasis on art. This unification of elite as learned men and artists grew out of the Five Dynasties period and shows how the emperors of the Song Dynasty sough to establish a unified nation through art and culture. Since the emperor himself was producing the art, it is inherently unique as it represents his well known style of "bird and flower" and how deeply entrenched the importance of the tie between art and the elite classes was .

The painting resembles later paintings in the Yuan dynasty in that it was the ancestor of the successive dynasty's art culture. Art similar to "Five-colored parakeet on a Blossoming Apricot Tree" has been found in Korea, Vietnam, and Japan as evidence of the Sinocentric East Asian world and Chinese influence in Asia . The painting also represents the idea of having leaders not be simply military and political leaders, but also as cultural influencers that can place direct pressure on the trends and development of art on the elite classes .

Bibliography

Britannica, The Editors of Encyclopaedia. "Huizong." Encyclopædia Britannica. April 07, 2008. Accessed November 11, 2018. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Huizong.

Britannica, The Editors of Encyclopaedia. "Hanlin Academy." Encyclopædia Britannica. February 17, 2016. Accessed November 12, 2018. https://www.britannica.com/topic/Hanlin-Academy.

Britannica, The Editors of Encyclopaedia. "Jin Dynasty." Encyclopædia Britannica. September 27, 2013. Accessed November 11, 2018. https://www.britannica.com/topic/Jin-dynasty-China-Mongolia-1115-1234.

Department of Asian Art. "Northern Song Dynasty (960–1127)." The Met's Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. October 2001. Accessed November 12, 2018. https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/nsong/hd_nsong.htm.

Ebrey, Patricia Buckley. Emperor Huizong. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2014.

"Five-colored Parakeet on a Blossoming Apricot Tree." Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. July 13, 2018. Accessed November 11, 2018. https://www.mfa.org/collections/object/five-colored-parakeet-on-a-blossoming-apricot-tree-29081.

Lawton, Mary S. "Huizong, Emperor." Oxford Art Online. Accessed November 11, 2018. http://www.oxfordartonline.com.proxy-remote.galib.uga.edu/groveart/view/10.1093/gao/9781884446054.001.0001/oao-9781884446054-e-7000039364.