Objects in Frames: Displaying Foreign Collectibles in Early Modern China and Europe by Anna Grasskamp

Abstract

Reviewed by: Objects in Frames: Displaying Foreign Collectibles in Early Modern China and Europe by Anna Grasskamp Andrea Bubenik Grasskamp, Anna, Objects in Frames: Displaying Foreign Collectibles in Early Modern China and Europe, Berlin, Dietrich Reimer, 2019; hardback; pp. 246; 81 colour, 12 b/w illustrations; R.R.P. €39.00; ISBN 9783496016243. What does it mean to frame collectible objects, as opposed to paintings, or works on paper? How is the framing of objects culturally determined? Does framing always render context irrelevant? This ambitious book proposes a transcultural approach to these questions and focuses on a variety of compelling case studies from China and Europe. Rather than offer a solely empirical or comparative approach, the philosophical and sociological dimensions of framing are also probed, with the author also showing a keen eye for the nuances of cultural difference. The concept of a frame has been much discussed regarding the two dimensional, but less attention has been paid to how three-dimensional objects have historically been framed and displayed. A great strength here is the focus on porcelain and coral fragments which were highly valued in the burgeoning court collections of the period. While the Kunstkammern and curiosity cabinets of Europe are well-known, less attention has been given to correspondent Chinese systems of display. Indeed, Anna Grasskamp’s book challenges the binary divisions of ‘Europe’ and ‘Asia’, ‘Netherlandish’, or ‘Chinese’, and instead allows for a more fluid and comparative approach to probe culturally defined systems of collecting and display. Chapter 1 focuses on how ‘foreign’ goods, including Chinese porcelain, were framed and mounted in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Kunstkammern. Chapter 2 takes the same approach but in the Chinese context, considering how European astronomical instruments were reframed at Chinese courts. Chapters 3 and 4 focus on the framing of foreign and natural objects in European Renaissance and Chinese Ming Dynasty collections. These chapters, with their focus on refashioned coral, are especially strong, probing how coral was perceived in both cultures as transformative ‘matter’ and related to resurrections and metamorphoses with Christ and Ovid on the one hand, and Buddhist worship on the other. Grasskamp rightfully points to the landmark publication of Exhibiting Cultures (Smithsonian Institute, 1991), and it is in this lineage that her book should be considered. The recent Getty publication of Samuel Quiccheberg’s Inscriptiones of 1565 (Getty Publications, 2013), one of the first museological texts, will also heighten interest in the themes and issues raised here. Overall, there is a sense that it is important to tend to the lives of objects, especially in the early modern period, an era that is increasingly recognized as global not only for its trade routes but also the circulation of objects and related ideas. [End Page 281] Andrea Bubenik The University of Queensland Copyright © 2022 Andrea Bubenik