Asian Art and Architecture Commons^™

White Snake, Black Snake Folk Narrative Meets Master Narrative In Qing Dynasty Sichuanese Cross-Stitch Medallions, Cory Willmott

Cory A. Willmott

The cross-stitch medallion in figure 1 was collected by my grandmother, Katherine Willmott, in the early 1920s when she was a missionary in Renshow, Sichuan Province, West China. Many years after I inherited it, I learned that it depicts a folk narrative called “White Snake; Black Snake” that was traditionally performed both on stage in the legitimate theaters and in Chinese shadow puppet dramas (Highbaugh n/d:6).

The story may be summarized as follows: There were two female snakes, White Snake and Black Snake, who were inseparable friends. They both changed into beautiful young women. White Snake got married and bore …

Japanese Painting And National Identity: Okakura Tenshin And His Circle, Victoria Weston

Victoria Weston

Japanese Painting and National Identity is the first monograph in English to address the art and philosophy of a group of Meiji painters regarded by many as seminal figures in the development of modern Japanese painting. Lead by the outspoken and widely published art critic Okakura Tenshin, this group, including artists Yokoyama Taikan, Shimomura Kanzan, Hishida Shunsô, and others, wrestled with the vexing problem of how to modernize traditional media, methods, and styles while keeping the results authentically Japanese. Yet they saw themselves not just as artists but as servants of the nation. Their task, they believed, was to give …