Giorgio Vasari’s educational background and association with Renaissance humanists engendered his familiarity with the texts and imagery of classical,emblematic,and mythographic traditions.Vasari’s composition of im...Giorgio Vasari’s educational background and association with Renaissance humanists engendered his familiarity with the texts and imagery of classical,emblematic,and mythographic traditions.Vasari’s composition of images as a compendium of iconography for a decorative program was in the vein of the literary practices of Andrea Alciato(1482-1550),Pierio Valeriano(1477-1558),and Vincenzo Cartari(1531-1590),and followed Paolo Giovio’s advice on how to depict an emblematic image or impresa1(Giovio,1559,p.9).For Giovio(1483-1552),an impresa or badge must contain a figure and motto,its meaning should be clear and precise,the imagery must be pleasant to look at,and the motto must be brief,inventive,and unambiguous.But sometimes Vasari did not follow his advice,relying more on the Renaissance Neoplatonic notion of a concept postulated by the Florentine philosopher Marsilio Ficino(1433-1499).In De vita coelitus comparanda(How Life Should Be Arranged According to the Heavens)2(Ficino,1489;1561-1563;1996,pp.7-19;Kerrigan&Braden,1989,pp.101-115).Ficino discusses the use and the magic potency of images by deliberating on the virtue of imagery,what power pertains to the figure in the Heavens and on Earth,which of the heavenly configurations are impressed on images by the ancients,and how the images are employed in antiquity3(Gombrich,1972,p.172;Chastel,1996,pp.81-89;Moore,1990,p.20,137,181;Bull,2006,pp.7-36).Vasari assimilated these concepts visually in the fresco painting of the Bride with a Rake(1548),located in one of the rooms in his house in Arezzo,the Chamber of Fortune(Chamber of Virtue),where he composed a paradoxical iconographic image-the subject of this essay.This essay is composed of two parts:an introduction to the location of the painting in the Casa Vasari in Arezzo and an iconographical and iconological interpretation of the imagery.展开更多
The white jade worship, born in the Shang and Zhou Dynasties, brought about a ＂Protestant Revolution＂ in the development history of Chinese jade mythology, which had deep influence on the nation＇s ideology and mate...The white jade worship, born in the Shang and Zhou Dynasties, brought about a ＂Protestant Revolution＂ in the development history of Chinese jade mythology, which had deep influence on the nation＇s ideology and material production in the following 3,000 years. The myths of the Yellow Emperor＇s eating the white jade cream and the Queen Mother of the West living in Kunlun Jade Mountain, as recorded in Classic of Mountains and Seas, are mythological imaginations of the historical reality that the jades were spread from the West to the East and recreated by people living in the early state of the Central Plains. All such motifs, no matter the white jade cream that produced black jades, the Yellow Emperor＇s planting the jade flowers, the Kunlun Jade Mountains （the Mountain of Jades） where the Queen Mother of the West lives or the Jade Lake, clearly show Chinese indigenous worship for the white jades. Scholars like Su Xuelin and Ling Chunsheng think that Queen Mother of the West is the goddess of the moon that originated from the old West Asian civilization. However, such idea is full of contradictions and flaws after the discovery of Chinese unique worship for white jades and the holy mountain of Kunlun. The book Classic of Mountains and Seas, with records of 140 mountains that produce jades and 16 mountains that produce white jades, can be the white jade worshippers＇ bible to explore the holy material resources.展开更多
文摘Giorgio Vasari’s educational background and association with Renaissance humanists engendered his familiarity with the texts and imagery of classical,emblematic,and mythographic traditions.Vasari’s composition of images as a compendium of iconography for a decorative program was in the vein of the literary practices of Andrea Alciato(1482-1550),Pierio Valeriano(1477-1558),and Vincenzo Cartari(1531-1590),and followed Paolo Giovio’s advice on how to depict an emblematic image or impresa1(Giovio,1559,p.9).For Giovio(1483-1552),an impresa or badge must contain a figure and motto,its meaning should be clear and precise,the imagery must be pleasant to look at,and the motto must be brief,inventive,and unambiguous.But sometimes Vasari did not follow his advice,relying more on the Renaissance Neoplatonic notion of a concept postulated by the Florentine philosopher Marsilio Ficino(1433-1499).In De vita coelitus comparanda(How Life Should Be Arranged According to the Heavens)2(Ficino,1489;1561-1563;1996,pp.7-19;Kerrigan&Braden,1989,pp.101-115).Ficino discusses the use and the magic potency of images by deliberating on the virtue of imagery,what power pertains to the figure in the Heavens and on Earth,which of the heavenly configurations are impressed on images by the ancients,and how the images are employed in antiquity3(Gombrich,1972,p.172;Chastel,1996,pp.81-89;Moore,1990,p.20,137,181;Bull,2006,pp.7-36).Vasari assimilated these concepts visually in the fresco painting of the Bride with a Rake(1548),located in one of the rooms in his house in Arezzo,the Chamber of Fortune(Chamber of Virtue),where he composed a paradoxical iconographic image-the subject of this essay.This essay is composed of two parts:an introduction to the location of the painting in the Casa Vasari in Arezzo and an iconographical and iconological interpretation of the imagery.
文摘The white jade worship, born in the Shang and Zhou Dynasties, brought about a ＂Protestant Revolution＂ in the development history of Chinese jade mythology, which had deep influence on the nation＇s ideology and material production in the following 3,000 years. The myths of the Yellow Emperor＇s eating the white jade cream and the Queen Mother of the West living in Kunlun Jade Mountain, as recorded in Classic of Mountains and Seas, are mythological imaginations of the historical reality that the jades were spread from the West to the East and recreated by people living in the early state of the Central Plains. All such motifs, no matter the white jade cream that produced black jades, the Yellow Emperor＇s planting the jade flowers, the Kunlun Jade Mountains （the Mountain of Jades） where the Queen Mother of the West lives or the Jade Lake, clearly show Chinese indigenous worship for the white jades. Scholars like Su Xuelin and Ling Chunsheng think that Queen Mother of the West is the goddess of the moon that originated from the old West Asian civilization. However, such idea is full of contradictions and flaws after the discovery of Chinese unique worship for white jades and the holy mountain of Kunlun. The book Classic of Mountains and Seas, with records of 140 mountains that produce jades and 16 mountains that produce white jades, can be the white jade worshippers＇ bible to explore the holy material resources.
