André Monlleo
March 10, 2014
CHINA
- China is made of many geographical sites; the longest continues civilization, full of Dynasties, with
some kind of stability. There are leader who take over. Sometimes there is more than one power in a
different location.
- There are different pronunciation systems, and there is different way of reading.
Paleolithic Period- 500,0005000 BCE
- Survival consumed
all of the time and effort
of early humans in
China
- They did not make
pottery, weave cloth,
build houses, or practice agriculture
- It was until 5000 BCE or so that fundamental life-style changes
began occurring.
NEOLITHIC CHINA-
We will be starting with the Neolithic Period.
In China, eventually people start to settle down, they settle in river valleys, places that
can support them.
THE YELLOW RIVER is the mother river of China, the China’s sorrow, because of the
flooding; it has caused some major damage to the country.
Yangzi
is the longest river in China, the 7th longest river in the world.
During the early periods, there were no pottery made, the houses were built of bone.
The sedentary.
The Neolithic period, styles, painted style, black burnish style. The Yangshao, is the painted
images on pottery.
Trenching, pounded earth (the flooring) easy to brush away.
KILN AREA // DITCH //
1.Sloping entrance
2. Plastered or daubed interior partition
3. central fire pit
4. plaster floor or bare earth.
5. let stalks reeds clay
5. straw thatch
6. brushwood.
Rectangular pit house.
Round hut,
Wattle and Daub Construction
(vines and saplings woven between supporting poles with mud applied to create)
Barrel jars- made of the coil attaching over and over, one coil at the time. It has been located an innumerous
number of pots. A decoration of a surface, the urge to make something beautiful. Pots are a metaphor of a human
body.
The belly, the neck...
In a funerary is very important as well, the vessel for the ashes, back in the pot, (the whom) the belly.
These design are very Chinese. Numerous ritual vases, with different values.
Yangshao
Chinese Neolithic Time Frame
Painted pottery cultures
usually buff to reddish clay with black painted
decoration. / Large use of “SLIP” liquefied
clay, very typical of these type of this period.
.Probably of a
symbolic significance, which can only be
guessed at today, the fish and the human head
with 3 pointed ‘halo’ motifs of Banpo move
slowly towards abstraction. This movement
from representation to abstraction is repeated
in much of the other Painted Pottery
decoration of north China. it can be seen, for
instance, in the flower motifs of Henan. Here
the sinuous movement of the motif
complements the profile of the pot in a way,
which makes it clear that it was deliberately chosen by the decorator
Longshan Period
Second Phase of Chinese Neolithic Culture – Black burnished pottery. ; Shandong (south-eastern)
- Dates are ca. 3500-2000 BCE; also called the Black Pottery period
- There is no painting on Lngshan Black Pottery
- Yangshao artists seem to focus on the visual aspect of the vessel
- Longshan artists seem to focus on the tactile aspect
Longshan SHAPES
YANGSHAO DECORATIONS.
-
The 3rd type of Neolithic ware was a Gray Corded pottery ca. 5000-1700
the production centers were in north-central China
body of vessel is gray; ussually thick-walled; sturdy looking
-
Black Burnished wear, fine very thin wear, for formal use, some kind of religious ritual. The shapes
are very refined.
Some of the thick clay black burnishing would be used for everyday life.
-
2 or 3 pieces that would be added to become a one long piece.
They were interested in shape, the appearance, kind of refined clean shape.A good deal of understanding how clay
reacts, it takes a great deal.
GRAY CORDED WARE
Third Phase of Chinese Neolithic Ware
gray unrefined clay
thick-walled
marks made by cord (heavy string)
Unrefined look, the cord shows into the pieces
Pressing a cord into a wet clay, you can see that is very ruff. It has great looking,
It also has a trypod vessels.
Stamps on the clay, using weaving baskets to make the form and texture.
The Longshan wear had a very looking of a burnishing wera, mimiking a metal. Making it look like an expencive
material.
Boss looking
Neolithic period we begin to see blades, very refined looking,
XIA Period
2100 1700BCE
This was the time were legendary people teached the people
how to do agriculture, ceramics, architecture....
Discoveries since 1920s seem to verify its existence
Anyang (YIN) – Places of writting on the bones, the earliest
writing form.
Shang Dynasty
1766 1111 BCE
Divided into 3 phases:
The bronze vessels have a tremendous information
on it.
The Had a tremendous cast system,
1st Dynasty that has been recorded. The writting that
we have is in materials that have not detirioraded
with the time.
The podery is a continuation of the Neolithic
Period.
The earliest bronze vessels come from
Mostly cooper, the empor started this prosses. This
ideas came from a lider and spreaded to the
population.
Royal toumbs were found from this period.
Religious rituals were found as well.
It was by a divide right, the
The king had a connection with the heaven.
The son of heaven.
Erlitou
Oracle bone, was written to comunicate if the year
was going to be good.
It is a form of divination, divining the future or the
present.
A rubbing of bones,
Sometimes a shoulder bone of the animal, anything
flat, that would be able to write.
Under belly of a turtle, was heated
1- Early2- Middle3- LateThe pottery is very similar of the Neolithic Period.
Of something pressed into the pot when it was
moderetely wet.
Bronze
Casting Technique.
3 notable patterns of decoration:
1. Taotiemotif if
a MASK ( flatten figure, a mask. horn, nasal
rib, division, upper jaw, eye, claw, paw tail.
(Splade figure)
It also references the weather, the clouds, and
the face, . It is a frighting figure,
2. Kuei- a small (dragon) this are the early
forms of the dragon, it has something to do
with the functionality of the piece, for
cooking , for serving . Very stylized dragons,
the dragon is moving through the air, a
power figure. The spiral is about power
about nature.
3. Leiwen- The “Thunder Spiral” – implies
rain, it has a similarity in the Indian Art,
they are often described as the force of
nature, the spiral goes on and on... A design
becomes something else over time. It about
fertility
LIDING– Three legged vessel for cooking and for
heating wine. It had handles.
GU tall, trumpet-shaped vessel is a
drinking cup, used for hot wine. Trumpet shape
Siqueira design usually
Jue – awkward, spindly wine
vessel; used for serving heated wine
in rituals, like a decanter of these
days, but in bronze.
Ding
– a square or rectangular
container on four legs used for cooking, usually
many bosses. It looks like a barbecue set in old
times.
GUI - food storage
container, the food would
be served on this as well.
Zun – Vase without handles
associated with ritual- for
holding wine. The shape is a vase
Yu- Vessel with handel and lid.
Fang Yu- square vessel with handle and lid
Guang – used for wine storage and serving.
Zoomorphic (animal) shaped animal.
SHANG TOMBS- rich, elaborate tombs were built in the late Shang phase (1300-1100 BCE)
- things used in life were placed in the tomb.
- ancestors could serve as intermediaries to heaven above.
- the tombs are very deep.
_ the escavation is huge.
- jade items, tourquise inlayd
Zhou Dynasty pronounced “joe”
111-221 BCE
mixed agriculture and hunting society
The is a moviment from one capital to another.
Fighting for power, they were called themselves the god like Dynasty, fighting for power.
Bronze casting passed from generations, The bronzes are more sculptural, the volume is bigger
in size.
LIDINGGUIZUNMIRRORS, MOST OF THEM ARE METAL, THE MIRROR side is not glass, but metal very
shinny.
Bells made of copper, from small to larger sizes.
THE LAKER WEAR, Made from some core, maybe cloth, light weight, very elegant looking.
Very BI, or PI shapes, with references to the sky, carved out of jade or sometimes bone.
Education was the idea to rise the behavior, the governemt should be trained by a
superior educated men.
Men needs to accept nature, and be aware of the operation of nature, 300 years later he
became relugious,
Confusionism- creating codes how humand should act
DAO- human, nature with the landscape.
1. Neolithic
2. shang
3. zou –pronounced “Joe”
4. Qin- “Chin’
5. Han
6. tang
7. song
8.
yuan ming
9. qing
QIN DYNASTYThe shortest Dynasty.
15 years
he destructed all historical books that could be found.
Standardized coins,
He worked on working the gaps of the wall, and worked to keep
control over the moroding groups from the north.
His repressive ruling, he was able to get things done.
He was constantly using and continuing what other ruler has
done.
He order a tomb for himself. Amassing tombs, in all
arquiological history.
He was very self important, and order to be done his tomb.
1974 the discovery was made, and his part of his tomb system
began to be excavate.
Very deep underground, the figures were made of Terra Cota.
The roof came down, and broke some of the figures.
7.000 figures, 11 parallel trenches. 700 feet long. The floor
would’ve
The Great wall- originally 3.000 today/ 800 miles survived. 25
feet high