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Pan-Hongshan Culture
Mysterious Chinese Black-shell Jade
Attributing black-shell jade to pan-Hongshan culture is based on the following two reasons, firstly, the plastic feature of black-shell jade shares many similarities with Hongshan jade excavated in Niuheliang, a place in the territory of Chifeng, Inner Mongolia. Both are originated from early cultures in Liaohe River basin. Secondly, so far no report on excavation of black-shell jade has been published which is essential for determining the age and independent cultural character of it (Mr. Bai Yue came up with the term of black-shell jade for the first time, in China Collection, January 2001, issue 37). Black-shell jade is heavy compared with its size, and is covered with blackish shell that has a look of iron cast. Under the shell it mainly consists of tremolite, which is rich in Liaohe River basin. The plasma mass spectrometry conducted by National Research Center for Geoanalysis show that the blackish shell of black-shell jade contains 35 chemical elements, the largest portion of which is manganese oxide (this is identical with the geographical chemical elements of Inner Mongolia region). The unearthing of black-shell jade drew wide attention from collectors and scholars in and outside China: Bai Yue, Zhu Zheng, Yao Zhen, Zhang Yiping, and Ren Nan from Beijing, Han Lianguo, Qian Yizhong, Ying Weida, Chen Yiming, Zhang Fan, and Sun Qingshi from Shanghai, Huang Kangtai and Li Xiangyun from Northeast China, Yang Tianyou from United States and Kim Heeyong and He-ll Kim from Korea. They all collect and study black-shell jade to varying degrees. As Korean collector Kim Heeyong put it, “Japanese were amazed seeing black-shell jade in Northeastern China during World War II. This drives me to come to China and study this prehistoric form of art, and I have been doing this for 18 years.” British Museum exhibits its collection of Chinese black-shell jade under the category of primitive sculptures.
There are many evidences indicating the long history of black-shell jade, but the study on it has just kicked off. A lot of questions are to be answered on its richness in plastic forms, on its foremost artistic feature, on its relation with culture in Liaohe River basin, on its connection with social tradition, daily life, religion, totem, war, myth and legend at its time, on its development with the society over time and on the cause of its sudden disappearance. So far we do not have any clue regarding these questions. Pan-Hongshan culture is well-known for its exquisite jade ware and its unique plastic form. Its artistic value and social development may be more advanced compared with contemporary primitive cultures in Yellow River basin and Yangzi River basin, and has an important position in History of Chinese cultural development. Based on my own study, I will present my own understanding here so as to induce further and deeper thinking on it.
1. The rich plastic forms of black-shell jade of pan-Hongshan culture shows the variety of social life at that time.
Black-shell jade of pan-Hongshan culture is basically sculptures and relief combined with hollow-out figures. It has a wide range of subject matters: human figure (men and women. Young and old), animals (birds and quadruped), sacrifice ceremony, totem and gods, reproduction worship, decorative wares, daily vessels, fishes, equipment and tools for working, and composite figures. For many reasons, our ancestor made jade sculptures and relief under multifaceted subject matters and recorded the life of their time. This is a precious reference for our study on prehistoric human lives.
2. The artistic creation that never repeats itself is the soul of pan-Hongshan black-shell jade.
The creative character of black-shell jade is also fascinating. Among tens of thousands of black-shell jade, not a single pair is found identical. For what reason those ancient men didn’t adopt the simple method of reproduction in the making of jade sculptures is a question that still lingers in my mind, and I am really astonished and impressed that our ancestors should have such inborn ability of artistic creation that follows the code of the nature.
The soul of art is profound because it is a practice of conceptual creation. It is hard for us to imagine how ancient men manage to take hold and realize this ability. Maybe the illusory and absurd subconscious of primitive human being can only rely on basic artistic intuition when making art works, and I wonder why representation (copy), the easiest method of artistic practice in modern society, should became so difficult for them. Maybe they never intended to copy from others’ and their own work, and which one is the reason that charged them with such intense and vigorous artistic expression: the fear of god, the need of survival, or the pious devotion? This is an issue worth further studying.
Among diversified subject matter of pan-Hongshan black-shell jade, one common subject matter is so called the sun-god. This kind of black-shell jade take a figure of a super natural being that has a head of ox and body of man. Black-shell jade on this subject matter accounts for 30 per cent of the total. In fact, the combination of animal and man is a popular image of totem in prehistoric societies. the figure of the Xiong’s is a combination of bear and man, of the Xuanyuan’s fish and man, of the Fuxi’s dragon and man, of the Shiwei’s pig and man, and of the Huantou’s bird and man. These combinations can be found in black-shell jade sculptures, and the combination of ox head and man body belongs to the Shennong’s. The South Sea and North Classic, a chapter in the ancient legend of Classic of Mountains and Sea, mentioned countries of men looked like dog. Fuxi has human head and snake body, and Emperor Yan has human body and ox head. In ancient Greek legend, Zeus transformed into a swan and impregnated young girl Leda, and Leda laid an egg from which the beauty named Helen hatched. From the similarities of the two legends that originated from different cultures, we can tell that the prehistoric society is full of beautiful myths and legends.
From 150-centimeter tall standing sculpture to 3-centimeter long decorative ware, black-shell jade of the sun-god are always in half-squatting or kneeling down gesture with arms around knees loosely. The legs are done in a mellow and strong manner, and the whole body is done in highly artistic condensation. Ox horn, the embodiment of divine being, is done in an even more verified manner. There are vertical horns, curved horns, forth inclined horns, back inclined horns and cross horns, some of which are not in accordance with physiological structure but are indeed reasonable and vivid. This exaggeration and verified artistic expression is never easy to master even for professionally trained sculptors of present times.
“Exaggeration and transformation” is an artistic term emerged in modern times. Since then, this way of expression has been widely used by artists. It is amazing to see the wide application of this method in black-shell jade of pan-Hongshan culture which is a primitive society existed thousands of years ago. For example, in some sculptures on subject matter of reproduction worship, the size of penis is amazingly huge and diameter of breast is exaggerated (to the extent that they almost occupy the whole chest). Generally speaking, Egyptian sculpture, Maya sculpture, Indian sculpture, Athens sculpture, and Italian sculpture during Renaissance are the best among all the ancient sculptures. But they could only trace back to as early as 4000 years ago, but black-shell jade of pan-Hongshan culture in Liaohe River basin should be older (the carbon 14 test conducted by Seoul National University in Korea shows that black-shell jade should has a history of 5000 odd years). There is no doubt that black-shell jade of pan-Hongshan culture will become a miracle of prehistoric art.
The information we get from black-shell jade show us that prehistoric men had a very strong sense of creation, imagination and expression, and they seemed to manage both abstract and figurative way of artistic expression (which is in fact a result of instinctive plastic ability of prehistoric men). This is showcased in the verified ways they treat the face of individual sculptures. Some sculptures have a mild face and some have angry faces. There is no detailing of each face, they all have bulged eyes with curves indicating their expression, and this brings a sense of rhythm and balance between the loose and the tight, the sparse and the dense. Abstract lines are also used to express organs like nose and ear. The curve of the lips showing different emotions (curve up means happy and curve down means angry) reminds us of the facial makeup in Beijing Opera. This ambiguity between likeness and unlikeness gives us a feeling of not being divine but human. Dragon, eagle, owl, cicada, and cloud-shaped Pei are subject matters of jade wares of Hongshan culture, and they are also the major subject matter of black-shell jade. Here, the notion of “to shape according to original couture and to carve according to character of material” gives same subject matter completely different expression and effect. The tense between figuration and exaggeration, simplicity and strength resulted in this mysterious and vivid art expression. After thorough comparison and analysis, we find that the handling of composition, expression techniques, feeling of life and plastic feature of it are not to be compared in modern times.
3. The plastic character of Black-shell jade of pan-Hongshan culture features combination of different creatures.
Black-shell jade of pan-Hongshan culture is often seen combining different creatures: two or more men, men and animal, men and god, or animal and god. There are variations and contradictions of these combinations, some are rough and straightforward, some are delicate and carefully polished, and both styles maintain a sense of unity, as if not made carefully but done at a stretch. I particular attach importance to cultural message of its era which black-shell jade of pan-Hongshan culture sends us. Artistic forms of each individual era deliver distinctive characteristics. The content, form and detail of black-shell jade of pan-Hongshan culture show the way of thinking and working of ancient men which is completely natural and without any trace of excessive and affected designing. The combinations of men and animal sometimes include upper part of an animal and lower part of a man, or upper part of a man and lower part of an animal, and sometimes men and animal share legs and feet. Whatever combination taken, all the sculptures show easy and free atmosphere. There are themes and stories attached to each and every sculptures, including touching love stories, elderly carrying child on the back, man carrying pig on the head, woman carrying a stick (for bird hunting) with an eagle on the shoulder, and “ox god ” carrying all sorts of animals in the arms. These themes reflect ancient men’s life and their invocation to god. These are too sculptures and relief combined with hollow-out figures, and are more multifaceted and classic. They form a unified entity as if done by hand of the nature, and show a mysterious and uncanny spirit of the era. It is worth notice that this combination type of black-shell jade of pan-Hongshan culture is comparable to jade sculptures of Shang, Zhou, Qing and Han dynasties in terms of artistic expression and technical process, and has its unique position in the history of world sculpture.
4. The color of black gives a heavy feeling to black-shell jade.
Why did jade of pan-Hongshan culture have a color of black? I think there are two possible explanations. The first is that it is black because of natural reasons of physical and chemical erosion. It may be buried in volcano ashes after an eruption. The second explanation comes down to artificial reasons, that for totem worship or religious reasons, ancient men painted black pigment on the sculptures of Xiuyan Jade or put them in fire for burning upon completion when they still had different original color and buried them. And I am also interested to know whether black-shell jade preceded Hongshan jade or to the contrary. Further work by state agencies is needed to excavate, inspect, study and solve these issues.
I think the color of black gives jade sculpture a mysterious and serious sense. Different types of jade differ in color. Transparent or semi-transparent Jade that has a color of white, yellow and green, and reflects a mild light is usually more valuable and higher-priced in the market. But from the perspective of visual arts, the quality and value of jade as a precious stone has nothing to do with the cultural value of jade sculptures. We like black-shell jade of pan-Hongshan culture and we collect or study it because it is beautiful and the color of black moves us. Ordinary jade wares are nice, but they lack a sense of simplicity. Black and white are the two ends of color spectrum, and all colors are contained in these two colors. These simple colored and imaginary jade sculptures along with the color of black bring weight and seriousness to themselves.
Among all the materials in the nature, jade was selected to convey ancient men’s idea, and after thousands of years of chemical (or artificial) reaction, a black shell formed on the original surface. This is the testimony of history. Black-shell jade is precious cultural heritage endowed to us by ancient men, and we will never cease to unveil its mystery and discover all sorts of its implied meanings!
Xia Dewu
Professor of Central Academy of Fine Arts
25th Jul, 2009 (first draft)
5th Dec, 2009 (second draft)
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发表于 2010-1-20 18:53:00
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发表于 2010-1-20 20:09:00
