A Chinese Collection In The Netherlands - art collection of Jean Theodore Royer
Magazine Antiques, Sept, 2000 by Jan Van Campen
Continued from page 1.
In the scene in Plate IV the adjoining room to the left is full of objects a refined Chinese would require. A case containing a book is on the table alongside a vase of flowers and an incense holder. Arranged in the cupboard are scroll paintings, small vases, a dish of fruit, musical instruments, tea caddies, and a teapot and small teacups. These are the sorts of things Royer collected as well: Chinese books, porcelain and soapstone vases, incense holders and incense, scroll paintings, and an enormous range of teapots and teacups. In his collection Chinese fruit was represented by paper-mache models and various kinds of tea were packed in the most ingenious ways. A scroll painting is rolled around four small lead tins of tea (Pl. IX), and other teas, also in lead containers, are packed into a box shaped exactly like the case for a Chinese book (Pl. XI).
It seems probable that Royer formed an idea of the kind of objects the Chinese scholar liked to have around from such sources as this plaque, and that he subsequently asked his acquaintances in China to send him similar things.
The plaque in Plate I shows a scholar in casual dress sitting on a couch, his books next to him. On the table near him are more books, a pot with brushes, an incense holder, and various small bowls. The low hardwood couch has marble panels in the back--a combination of materials repeated in chairs in Royer's collection (see Pl. VIII). However, Royer's chairs mix Chinese materials with the shape of chairs made for the Dutch in Batavia. In Canton Chinese craftsmen could be found to make any style of furniture required.
Gradually Royer re-created the world depicted on these enameled plaques on the first floor of his house in The Hague. He even had a life-sized model of a Chinese man clothed in real Chinese garments. [7]
Royer's writings about aspects of Chinese life combine published information, his own observations, and gleanings from his sources in China. Thus, in an essay about ginseng, the root of which was used in China as a remedy for all kinds of ailments, he presented the facts and opinions from a wide range of European authors augmented by information supplied by Hemmingson when he sent a sample of the root itself. [8] Hemmingson gave instructions on how to preserve and prepare ginseng and had personally consulted Chinese physicians on its uses, so Royer's information was both reliable and exclusive.
A similar combination is evident in Royer's manuscript essay on lacquerware. [9] He opened with a summary of the available facts about Chinese and Japanese lacquerware garnered from the reference books in his library. Then he noted phenomena clearly discernible on lacquer pieces in his own collection that, as far as he knew, had not appeared in the published sources. The simplest pieces, he wrote, were painted black and covered with transparent varnish, as could be seen by looking at them in a bright light from the proper angle. He also explained that the term "salvocate," which is frequently found in eighteenth-century descriptions, originated from a Portuguese word and means decoration in which the entire surface is dusted with gold (nashiji in Japanese) (see Pl. XIII). Yet another technique of which he had not located a description in published sources was inlay of silver, gold, or mother-of-pearl inset into lacquer (see Pl. XII).
Royer's last manuscript essay relied even more on observation of his own collection. In it he challenged an opinion voiced by various authors of travels in China. He explained, correctly, that the paintings and sculptures of so-called lions were not of lions at all but of a mythical animal. [10] His examples included some of his paintings (see Pl. XV) and porcelain vases (see Pl. XIV), and he could have included his soapstone and bamboo carvings (see Pl. X). His reasoning was that these animals did not resemble lions because lions were not indigenous to China. They had been kept in imperial menageries since the Tang dynasty (618-906), but the so-called lions in question were based on Buddhist depictions that were widespread in China, along with Buddhism itself, in the seventh century Royer compared this Buddhist lion with mythical Chinese animals such as the feng-huang (phoenix), the qilin (unicorn), and the dragon, which, he noted, were frequently found as decorative motifs on clothes, furniture, and hair or naments worn by Chinese women. Again, these observations may have been prompted by the various objects in his collection.
In the inventory of Royer's collection, some objects are listed as being accompanied by a "statement of explanation" written by the collector. An example is his extensive Chinese apothecary with five hundred ingredients for medicines and a piece of white wax (also used for medicinal purposes)." [11] The most intriguing examples of objects accompanied by explanations are seven musical instruments, including drums, cymbals, a flute, and a mouth organ (sheng). [12] The latter (Pl. XVII) consists of an air chamber at the bottom from which a cluster of bamboo pipes of various lengths extend, with tones being obtained by blocking one or more of the holes in the pipes (see Pl. XVI). In fact, Royer's mouth organ may possibly have come from Japan, where the instrument was also played, rather than China. He also collected information about how music in China was played, his principal source being a series of trompe-l'oeil paintings of Chinese instruments (see Pl. XVIII). According to the 1816 inventory, these were original ly "12 large leaves, on which...76 figures are painted, showing all the musical instruments of the Chinese, with their names and extensive manuscript statements in French to serve as explanation etc." [13] These leaves, later pasted onto canvas, show each instrument accompanied by its name in Chinese characters. The explanations in French are now lost. However, explanatory documentation of objects in a collection represent the sort of completeness collectors of the time strove for.
Royer's albums of gouaches contain many portrayals of musicians demonstrating their instruments (see Pl. XVI). One of the finest objects in his porcelain collection, the vase shown in Plate XIX, depicts women playing various instruments for a lady being fanned by servants (not visible). And in Royer's library was a detailed illustrated article by Joseph Marie Armiot about Chinese music and musical instruments in volume six of the Memoires concernant les Chinois (Paris, 1779).
Royer became one of the leading authorities about China in the Netherlands, and many people made grateful use of his advice and knowledge. The fame of his collection eventually reached the ear of the stadtholder, Prince William V (1751-1795), and his wife, Princess Wilhelmina (1751-1820) of Prussia. In 1775 Royer was invited to court to display his Chinese garments, jewelry, and accessories. He was accompanied by Jean Paul Certon's Chinese servant, who was in the Netherlands at the time. Travelers who passed through The Hague on the grand tour would visit Royer and marvel at his collection, his expertise, and his knowledge of East Asian languages.
Collecting and studying Chinese objects with the aim of acquiring and disseminating knowledge was the particular contribution of this enthusiastic eighteenth-century amateur scholar. Fortunately for us, his widow assured the preservation of the collection making a bequest to the Dutch king, who in turn, placed it in a museum.
An exhibition entitled Royer's Chinese Cabinet is on view from September 9 until March 11, 2001, at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam. It is accompanied by an illustrated catalogue in Dutch.
JAN VAN CAMPEN, an ad interim curator in the department of Asiatic art at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, recently completed his Ph.D. at the University of Leiden on the subject of Jean Theodore Royer anti his Chinese collection.
(1.) Description of the estate, February 17-23, 1815, inv. no. 6335, no. 44 (National Archive, Municipal Archives, The Hague).
(2.) "Inventaris van bet Cabinet Rariteiten nagelaten door Mevrouw J.L. Oldenbarneveld, Weduwe van den Heere J.T. Roijer," 1816. (no. 865 in Rikjksmuseum Archive, State Archives of Noord-Holland in Haarlem, the Netherlands). Hereafter cited as the inventory of 1816.
(3.) Certon to Royer, aboard ship en route to China, September 21, 1775 (inv. no. 949, Rijksmuseum Archive).
(4.) Les memoires de Charles de Constant sur la commerce a la Chine, ed. Louis Dermigny (S.E.V.P.N., Paris, 1964), p. 49.
(5.) Galbert to Royer, undated (inv. no. 951, Rijksmuseum Archive).
(6.) Wang to Royer, Canton, October 24, 1773; November 11, 1774; and December 14, 1776 (inv. no. 950, Rijksmuseum Archive).
(7.) No. 27 in the inventory of 1816.
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