Exhibition of Chinese Art at South Kensington

Abstract

THE exhibition of Chinese art at the Royal Academy, Burlington House, closed on March 7, when the number of visitors had reached the remarkable total of 422,048. This number constitutes a record for all the recent winter exhibitions, with the exception of the exhibition of Italian art. It justifies the opinion expressed at the time the exhibition opened that the quality of Chinese art, when once certain conventions had been assimilated, was such in its general outlook and approach to reality as was likely to appeal to the susceptibilities of a British public. This was most strikingly manifested in the attention attracted by the transcendent qualities of the scroll landscape paintings; but it was also to be noted that the bronzes and other exhibits belonging to the early prehistoric period and the T'ang figures received little less detailed inspection, so far as conditions allowed. The popularity of the exhibition did not, indeed, conduce to a full appreciation of the subtler qualities of this great art, and it is, therefore, all the more gratifying to leam from the Directors of the British Museum and Victoria and Albert Museum that arrangements are being made for the exhibition at South Kensington at an early date of the Eumorfopoulos collection of Chinese art. This exhibition will include not only the purchased objects already assigned to South Kensington and the British Museum respectively, which will be brought together again for this purpose, but also that part of the collection of which the purchase is not yet complete, through the generous public spirit of the owner. If the public displays an interest in this collection in any way comparable to the enthusiasm shown at Burlington House, it should prove a strong incentive to early action in providing the much desired Museum of Asiatic Art, so greatly needed in London.