2016 / LACMA “Alternative Dreams” 17th-century Chinese painting exhibition, Aug. 7 – Dec. 4
The Tsao family collection of Chinese art are exhibited at the Resnick Pavilion in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. (Cultural News Photo)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art
Resnick Pavilion
New Exhibition
Alternative Dreams: 17th –Century Chinese Paintings from the Tsao Family Collection
August 7 – December 4, 2016
Dong Qichang (1555 – 1636) Landscape in the Style of Wang Meng (ca. 1308 – 1385) The Tsao Family Collection. Photo by Michael Tropea.
Alternative Dreams: 17th-Century Chinese Paintings from the Tsao Family Collection presents one of the finest existing collections of the 17th century Chinese paintings in the U.S., formed over a period of 50 years by Bay Area collector and dealer Jung Ying Tsao.
The 17th century witnessed the fall of the Chinese-ruled Ming dynasty (1368 – 1644) and the founding of the Manchu-ruled Qing dynasty (1644 – 1911), and was one of the most turbulent and creative era in the history of Chinese art.
Comprising 130 paintings, the exhibition explores ways in which artists of the late Ming and early Qing dynasties used painting, calligraphy, and poetry to create new identities as means of negotiating the social disruptions that accompanied the fall of the Ming dynasty.
The exhibition presents works by many of the most famous painters of this period – including scholars, officials, and Buddhist monks. Alternative Dreams begins with Dong Qichang (1555 – 1636), universally considered the most protean Chinese artist of the last 500 years, and includes major and previously unpublished works by Gong Xian, Fu Shan, Hongren, Bada Shanren, Daoji, Wang Hui, and Wang Yuanqi.
Curator: Stephen Little, Chinese and Korean Art, LACMA
Credit: This exhibition was organized by the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and made possible by the Mozhai Foundation.
