.jpg?w=1)
拍品專文
Portuguese traders have landed at a port in Japan, presumably Nagasaki, and are greeted by Portuguese Jesuits from the local mission. The scene lays out a stunning panoply of exotica, casting the "southern barbarians" in the most favorable light. The artist caters to a widespread curiosity about the strange costumes and odd physiognomy (especially the large noses) of the Portuguese and their slaves and betrays no fear of the unknown. He lovingly records the balloon-like bagginess of the foreigners' bombacha pantaloons, the ruffled collars, the large white handkerchiefs they carry, their fancy sword hilts, heavy bejewelled necklaces, and amusing felt hats.
The Portuguese nao do trato was known to the Japanese as kurofune (black ship) or Namban bune, the ship of the "southern barbarians," so called because these foreigners arrived from the south. The ship was a three-deck carrack of up to 1,600 tons, and its enormous size was the cause of much wonder and excitement in Japan at the time of its annual visit. The Portuguese made large profits exchanging Chinese silk for Japanese silver. The carrack set off for Macao and Japan from Goa, the center of the Portuguese empire in Asia, and many of the crew were dark-skinned natives of the Indian subcontinent. Portuguese ships were permitted access to the Bay of Nagasaki from 1571 until 1640, when the shogun put into effect a seclusionist policy that closed the country to all outsiders other than Chinese merchants, a handful of Dutch traders, and occasional Korean emissaries. Within a few years Christianity was a capital offense and the representation of Iberians taboo. The fad for Namban art was at its peak between about 1590 and 1614.
The great ship is dramatically silhouetted against an expanse of gold. Sails have been dismantled by acrobatic black slaves. The main event is the meeting of the foreign traders and the Jesuits. A servant holds a cloth parasol over the head of the captain-major, who leads the colorful procession into town. The welcoming committee consists of two Portuguese Jesuits in long, black cassocks. (During the brief period when Japan was open to the West, Nagasaki was the seat of the Society of Jesus.) Among the local converts carrying rosaries are a Chinese and an elderly samurai. The Catholic chapel is shown directly above them.
The first Catholic priest to arrive in Japan was described by a 17th-century Japanese chronicler as
a creature you couldn't put a name to, that [appeared to have] human form at first [glance], but might as well be a long-nosed goblin, or a long-necked demon of the sort that disguise themselves as Buddhist lay-priests in order to trick people. Careful inquiry [revealed] that the creature was called a 'Padre'. The first thing one noticed was how long its nose was! It was like a wartless conch-shell, stuck onto [his face] by suction. How big its eyes were! They were like a pair of telescopes, but the irises were yellow. Its head was small; it had long claws on its hands and feet. It was over seven feet tall and was black in color, [but] its nose red; its teeth were longer than a horse's teeth, and its hair was mouse-grey. Above its forehead it'd shaved a spot on its pate about the size of an over-turned sake cup. Its speech was incomprehensible to the ear; its voice resembled the screech of an owl. Everyone ran to see it, mobbing the roads with abandon. (Quoted in Ronald P. Toby, "The 'Indianness' of Iberia and changing Japanese iconographies of Other," in Stuart B. Schwartz, ed., Implicit Understandings [Cambridge University Press, 1994], pp. 326-27.)
The composition and figure style are derived from a pair of screens by Kano Naizen (1570-1617) in the Kobe City Museum of Namban Art. Naizen traveled to Nagasaki in the 1590's and subsequently specialized in Namban screens. The now missing left-hand screen would have shown the departure of the carrack from a foriegn port. The Naizen screens are illustrated in Kobe shiritsu namban bijutskan zuroku/Pictorial Record of Kobe City Museum of Namban Art (Kobe: Kobe City Museum of Namban Art, 1968), vol. 1, figs. 19-20; Doris Croissant and Lothar Ledderose et al., Japan und Europa 1543-1929 (Berlin: Argon, 1993), pl. 31, pp. 60-61; and Okamoto Yoshimoto and Takamizawa Tadao, Namban byobu (Tokyo: Kashima Shuppankai, 1970), fig. 18 and pl. 18.
The Portuguese nao do trato was known to the Japanese as kurofune (black ship) or Namban bune, the ship of the "southern barbarians," so called because these foreigners arrived from the south. The ship was a three-deck carrack of up to 1,600 tons, and its enormous size was the cause of much wonder and excitement in Japan at the time of its annual visit. The Portuguese made large profits exchanging Chinese silk for Japanese silver. The carrack set off for Macao and Japan from Goa, the center of the Portuguese empire in Asia, and many of the crew were dark-skinned natives of the Indian subcontinent. Portuguese ships were permitted access to the Bay of Nagasaki from 1571 until 1640, when the shogun put into effect a seclusionist policy that closed the country to all outsiders other than Chinese merchants, a handful of Dutch traders, and occasional Korean emissaries. Within a few years Christianity was a capital offense and the representation of Iberians taboo. The fad for Namban art was at its peak between about 1590 and 1614.
The great ship is dramatically silhouetted against an expanse of gold. Sails have been dismantled by acrobatic black slaves. The main event is the meeting of the foreign traders and the Jesuits. A servant holds a cloth parasol over the head of the captain-major, who leads the colorful procession into town. The welcoming committee consists of two Portuguese Jesuits in long, black cassocks. (During the brief period when Japan was open to the West, Nagasaki was the seat of the Society of Jesus.) Among the local converts carrying rosaries are a Chinese and an elderly samurai. The Catholic chapel is shown directly above them.
The first Catholic priest to arrive in Japan was described by a 17th-century Japanese chronicler as
a creature you couldn't put a name to, that [appeared to have] human form at first [glance], but might as well be a long-nosed goblin, or a long-necked demon of the sort that disguise themselves as Buddhist lay-priests in order to trick people. Careful inquiry [revealed] that the creature was called a 'Padre'. The first thing one noticed was how long its nose was! It was like a wartless conch-shell, stuck onto [his face] by suction. How big its eyes were! They were like a pair of telescopes, but the irises were yellow. Its head was small; it had long claws on its hands and feet. It was over seven feet tall and was black in color, [but] its nose red; its teeth were longer than a horse's teeth, and its hair was mouse-grey. Above its forehead it'd shaved a spot on its pate about the size of an over-turned sake cup. Its speech was incomprehensible to the ear; its voice resembled the screech of an owl. Everyone ran to see it, mobbing the roads with abandon. (Quoted in Ronald P. Toby, "The 'Indianness' of Iberia and changing Japanese iconographies of Other," in Stuart B. Schwartz, ed., Implicit Understandings [Cambridge University Press, 1994], pp. 326-27.)
The composition and figure style are derived from a pair of screens by Kano Naizen (1570-1617) in the Kobe City Museum of Namban Art. Naizen traveled to Nagasaki in the 1590's and subsequently specialized in Namban screens. The now missing left-hand screen would have shown the departure of the carrack from a foriegn port. The Naizen screens are illustrated in Kobe shiritsu namban bijutskan zuroku/Pictorial Record of Kobe City Museum of Namban Art (Kobe: Kobe City Museum of Namban Art, 1968), vol. 1, figs. 19-20; Doris Croissant and Lothar Ledderose et al., Japan und Europa 1543-1929 (Berlin: Argon, 1993), pl. 31, pp. 60-61; and Okamoto Yoshimoto and Takamizawa Tadao, Namban byobu (Tokyo: Kashima Shuppankai, 1970), fig. 18 and pl. 18.