7. The Wu Family Shrines, Filial Piety, and Broadway Boogie Woogie

 

I. Objects

•  Piet Mondrian, Broadway Boogie Woogie . 1942-1943.   Oil on canvas; 50 x 50 in. (127 x 127 cm).

•  Wu family shrines (Wuzhai ci or citang 武宅祠堂 ). Eastern Han Dynasty, 147-168 CE.   Jiaxiang County, Shandong Province. Focus on the scene of the “assassin” Cao Mo seizing the Duke Huan of Qi from the west wall of Wu Liang's shrine (shrine #3 in the cemetery).

•  Anthony Barbieri-Low.   Digital reconstruction of the shrine.   2005.

•  Gao Yi's graveyard in Sichuan province, 209 CE.   Que tower west of gate, H: 9.9 m

II. Concept:   context

Thus everything that is regarded as a thing in itself, as one , must be viewed…as a complex .   Conversely, everything in a complex must be seen as part of that complex: as part of a whole .   Then we will always see relationships and always know one thing through the other.   –Piet Mondrian.

III. Terms

jinshixue Study of bronzes and stone; epigraphy

que Towers which mark the gate to the graveyard and were used to mark the entry to an official building, altar, temple, palatial compound, pass or city

stele also stela pl. steles also stelae An upright stone or slab with an inscribed or sculptured surface, used as a monument or as a commemorative tablet

“costume-and-crown avenue” ( yiguan dao )

spirit path ( shendao )

low relief Sculptural relief that projects very little from the background. Also called bas-relief.

high relief Sculptural relief in which the modeled forms project from the background by at least half their depth.

cartouche framed text or name, usually vertically oriented

IV. Texts

•  In the fourth day of guichou , in the third month of gengxu , in the first year of the Jianhe era [147 CE], Jupiter was in the position of dinghai .   The filial [elder] son, Wu Shigong, and his younger brothers, Suizong [i.e. Wu Liang], Jingxing, and Kaiming, entrusted the masons Meng Li and Li's younger brother Mao to build these pillars.   The cost was 150,000 [cash].   Sun Zong made [a pair of] lions.   The cost was 40,000 [cash]. (inscription on the western pillar, trans. Wu, 25).

•  …In the summer of the first year of the Yuanjia era [151 CE], at age 74, [Wu Liang] fell ill and died, alas.   His filial sons, Zhongzhang, Jizang, and Jili, and the filial grandson, Ziqiao, personally followed the path of son-ly duty and spent everything they had [to construct the shrine].   They chose excellent stones from south of the southern mountain; they took those of perfect quality with flawless and unyellowed color.   In front they established an altar; behind they erected an offering shrine. (stele of Wu Liang, trans. Wu, 25)

•  Ouyang Xiu refused to even guess at the name of the dedicatee on one stele, about whom “only the surname Kong, his position in a genealogical sequence and a few governmental posts could be known.   “The graphs for his name have been effaced and cannot be seen,” Ouyang asserted.   Not surprisingly, the stele entered his record [in 1117] merely as “the stele of a Kong gentleman of the Eastern Han.”   In contrast, [a scholar named] Zhao Mingcheng was confident in his identification of the stele [a century later].   “Nowadays, though the inscription is fragmentary,” Zhao wrote, “the graphs are nevertheless completely intelligible.   It says that the gentleman's tabooed name was Biao and that he was self-styled Yuansheng.”   (Brown [2008], 182).

•  We will erect a preservation hall to protect the carvings.   People will find it easier to make rubbings from these carvings, and reproductions will spread far and wide.   People will recognize the importance of taking good care of these objects, and the carvings will exist forever.   Would not this be more important than if only two or three antiquarians could enjoy them! (Huang Yi, translated by Wu, 5)

•  The late Han Attendant Wu had the personal name Liang...   The attendant embodied the outstanding virtues of loyalty and filial piety… He studied widely and examined [the texts] in detail.   He inquired into the roots of texts, and there was no book he did not read. The departments of the prefecture and the district invited and summoned him [to official posts], but he declined on the grounds of illness.   He contented himself with the poverty of his humble home and was pleased with the righteousness he learned every morning.   He never tired of teaching people the great Dao. (excerpt from Wu Liang's epitaph at the shrine site, translated by Wu, 97).

•  Master You said, “A filial and fraternal person would hardly be inclined to defy his superiors.   A person who is not inclined to defy his superiors will never stir up a rebellion.   A perfecting person strives for the root.   When the root is established, the way grows.   Filial and fraternal senses are at the root of humanity.” ( Analects 1.2 trans. Hyong Rhew lecture notes 2007)

•  Someone asked Master Kong, “Why are you not involved in government?”   The master said, “The Book of Documents says, ‘Just cultivate filial conduct and be kind to brothers.   That will contribute to governing.'   That is also governing.   Why would I be involved in government?” ( Analects 2.21, trans. Hyong Rhew lecture notes 2007)

•  Lord on High in the August Heaven and the Spirits of the Great Earth sent their command, entrusting the people to me.   I dared not accept the charges of being their parent…from high above being the heart of heaven and earth, and to down below being the place where people can return to… everyone below said, “The great command of the august heaven should not be left unanswered.”   Can I dare not accept it respectfully? (Fan Ye, “Annals of Emperor Guangwudi,” Hou Hanshu , 1A, p. 22, trans. Hyong Rhew lecture notes 2007).

V.   Bibliography

Brown, Miranda. “Han Steles: How To Elicit What They Have to Tell Us.” In Re-Envisioning Culture: Ideals, Practices, and Problems of the Han Dynasty Wu Family Shrines. Ed. Cary Liu, 180-195.   Princeton: Princeton Art Museum, 2008.

_____.   “Mothers and Sons in Warring States and Han China, 453 BC-AD 220.” Nan nü: Men, Women, and Gender in Early and Imperial China 5, no. 2 (2003):   137-169.

Howard, Angela Falco, et al.   Chinese Sculpture .   New Haven and London:   Yale University Press; Beijing:   Foreign Languages Press, 2006.

Liu, Cary, ed. Re-Envisioning Culture: Ideals, Practices, and Problems of the Han Dynasty Wu Family Shrines. Princeton: Princeton Art Museum, 2008. ( forthcoming )

Mattick, Paul, Jr.   “Context.”   In Critical Terms for Art History .   2d ed.   Eds. Robert Nelson and Richard Schiff, 110-127.   Chicago, London:   University of Chicago Press, 2003.

Mondrian, Piet.   The New Art—The New Life:   The Collected Writings of Piet Mondrian .   Ed. and trans. Harry Holtzman and Martin S. James.   New York:   Da Capo, 1993.

Powers, Martin.   Art and Political Expression in Early China .   New Haven:   Yale, 1991.

Wu Hung.   The Wu Liang Shrine:   The Ideology of Early Chinese Pictorial Art .   Stanford:   Stanford University Press, 1989.

Yang, Xiaoneng, ed.   The Golden Age of Chinese Archaeology:   Celebrated Discoveries from the People's Republic of China .   London, New Haven:   Yale University Press, 1999.