According to incomplete statistics, the public and private museums and private collections of Japanese, American, Canadian, British, French, German, Russian and other countries have only appeared in the bibliography of no less than 30,000 paintings. As for the parts hidden in museums, private collection institutions and private hands, we do not know how many. Works in private hands and private collections are a very large number, even at the most conservative estimates. The author only read some of the materials in his hand extensively, preliminarily sorted out, hidden in private hands, including some private collection institutions (most of which are private collections), from Jin to Yuan paintings no less than 600 paintings (although some of them are debatable, but most of them are authentic), which is indeed a surprising number.
Overseas collections
In modern times, China's paintings have been lost overseas on a large scale, starting with the british and French troops in 1860 and the Eight-Power Alliance invading Beijing twice in 1900, and a large number of Chinese cultural relics have flowed overseas, and it was at this time that gu Kaizhi's "Female History Proverbs" of the Song Dynasty, which is the most refined collection in the Qing Palace, flowed overseas. In the early years of the Republic of China, the deposed emperor Puyi stole more than a thousand precious paintings of legal books, and there were also many famous calligraphy and paintings in the hands of the old Wang Sun, which became the object of hunting by outsiders. After the end of World War II, the puppet Manchuria collapsed, and the great traces of calligraphy and painting in the original Qing Palace in the Changchun Puppet Palace were all scattered, and a number of paintings flowed overseas. In 1949, the Kuomintang regime collapsed, and a large number of painting treasures left the mainland and went overseas.
Overseas, there have also been public and private collection institutions famous for collecting Chinese paintings, especially the great monuments of the Song and Yuan Dynasties, forming three major Chinese painting collection centers in Asia, mainly in Japan, the Americas, and Europe. And because most of them are private institutions supported by foundations (the vast majority of museums in the United States are private), or privately funded collections, the collection of overseas ancient Chinese paintings has a strong economic support. For example, the Cleveland Museum in the United States received a private donation of $90 million in 1979; the Boston Museum has the strong support of the William Foundation, which provides a solid economic foundation for the collection of famous Chinese paintings.
Southern Song Dynasty Jiang Ginseng Sunset Fishing Chart is now in the Collection of The Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, USA
In the 1920s and 1930s, the American missionary Fu Kaisen collected a wide range of cultural relics and paintings in China, except for some of which were donated to Central University (now Nanjing University), and the rest all flowed into the United States. He himself has also written some of the works, leaving behind materials for future generations to study. In the 1930s, Japanese collectors and art historians published Chinese painting materials in Japan, and published some chinese paintings in Japan, both public and private. Japan has not been interrupted in this regard, and several generations of art history research experts have produced fruitful results in successive lights. In the 1960s and 1970s, the United States entered the peak of chinese painting research, and after the 1980s, it gradually became the center of research, and a group of scholars with international influence represented by Gao Juhan, Fu Shen, He Huijian, Luo Fan, Fang Wen, and Li Zhujin appeared, representing the highest level of overseas Chinese painting research.
It is the overseas private collectors (including overseas Chinese collectors who left the mainland) and private collection institutions that provide exquisite Song and Yuan monuments, providing an extremely rich research object for overseas sinologists, so that overseas research on Chinese art history has quickly grown into an important part of the humanities. Relying on this batch of chinese painting monuments overseas, academic centers for the study of Chinese painting have been formed in Japan, the United States and Europe, and echoed with Chinese mainland, Hong Kong and Taiwan, thus driving the development of overseas humanities and becoming a new extension of humanities in Japan, Europe and the United States.
Echoes within the sea
As early as the 1950s, China had already begun the search for Chinese paintings collected overseas, such as the "Collection of Ancient Chinese Paintings Hidden Abroad" edited by Zheng Zhenduo. After 1949, China paid more attention to this work, and the publication of this book was already at the beginning, but for various reasons, this work did not continue and was suspended with the sudden death of Zheng Zhenduo. Of course, China's relevant professional researchers have not stopped their research work in this regard, among which the representatives are Mr. Yang Renkai of the Liaoning Museum and Professor Lin Shuzhong of the Nanjing Academy of arts. In terms of special research, such as the collection of scattered calligraphy and paintings in the Forbidden City, the former has accumulated 30 years of efforts to compile the book "National Treasure Sinking and Floating - The Forbidden City Scattered Calligraphy and Painting Observation and Examination Strategy", a total of 1321 pieces of calligraphy and painting, including more than 1200 pieces of the Forbidden City, nearly 120 pieces of exodus, and nearly 300 works that have not yet been discovered (of which a large number of works have flowed overseas, or have been destroyed or have not existed, or are still in the hands of private collectors in China), mainly in the Song and Yuan Dynasties.
Southern Song Dynasty Liang Kai Ze Pan Xing Yin Tu is now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art
Professor Lin Shuzhong of Nanjing University of the Arts, with 16 years of efforts, taking advantage of the opportunity of going abroad to lecture and research, vigorously collected outflow of Chinese painting pictures and text materials, the collection of overseas paintings has reached more than 23,000, of which the European part and the Southeast Asian part are not yet sufficient, And the public and private collections in Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan in China are not within the scope of collection. According to Tu Suoji, mainly the plates published by major museums in the world, he basically sorted out the general situation of scattered overseas paintings, provided extremely valuable first-hand information for the in-depth study of relevant topics, and at the same time began further research work with profound art historiography skills. In fact, the new understanding of certain chapters of Chinese painting history and art history and the further integration of new materials and new concepts have had a profound impact on the future development of art historiography.
As for the number of famous Chinese paintings scattered in the hands of private individuals, there is no more accurate figure, and as the study of ancient Chinese painting continues to deepen, it is very certain that new discoveries will be made.
The general trend of reflux
After 1949, China has begun to buy back famous paintings from chinese dynasties, and Premier Zhou entrusted the cultural relics department to buy back precious Tang, Wu dynasty, Song and Yuan famous paintings in Hong Kong. For example, "Xiaoxiang Tu", "Han Xizai Night Feast Map", "Five Bull Chart", and the "Four Seasons Landscape Album" with the inscription of Liu Songnian of the Southern Song Dynasty were all purchased and recovered from Hong Kong in the 1950s, which played a very good role in the return of rare treasures to the homeland, and opened the way for the return of famous paintings collected overseas.
Song Anon. Heting Baby Play is now in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts
After the 1980s, with the great progress of China's economy and the great success of reform and opening up, the return of famous paintings from past generations has been accelerating more and more, except for some of them returning in the form of donations, most of them have flowed back to China in the form of purchases. The former, such as the 233 precious calligraphy and paintings collected by the Two Tu Xuan of the Museum donated by the Zhuang family in the Philippines in 2017, including figures, landscapes, flowers, birds, calligraphy and other works of art from the Song, Ming and Qing dynasties to more than 800 years in modern times, were returned in this way. The collections of overseas private collectors and private collectors have become a more common way to circulate in the form of transactions and return to China. With China's accession to the WTO, it has become a reality to integrate with the world, and it has also further provided conditions for the return of famous paintings from chinese dynasties.
Selected from China Literature and Art Review Network