The Social Life of Inkstones Read Along: Chapter 1

[forestofglory]

Welcome to the second post of our read a long of The Social Life of Inkstones: Artisans and Scholars in Early Qing China by Dorothy Ko! For this post we are reading: Chapter 1. The Palace Workshops: The Emperor and His Servants.

Previous posts:
Introduction

You are welcome to join in at any time!

In this chapter we looked at the Qing court and the inkstone makers there. Here are some optional discussion questions:

What where the main arguments in this chapter? Did you find them convincing?

Did any historical figures introduced in the chapter stand out to you? In what way?

Did any of the inkstones in the chapter stand out to you? In what way?

What did this chapter make you want to learn more about?

Comments

[rhysiana]

I've been thinking a lot about what Yongzheng seemed to want from his workshop system, and I think in modern terms it would be described as exclusive commercial art, at least for the gift-giving side, as opposed to fine art one-of-a-kind pieces, which would be more like that statue he commissioned and then micromanaged to death. (I don't know if that clarifies anything, I've just been thinking about what a fascinating environment it must have been to work in.)

[cortue]

That makes sense! I was thinking it might be like limited runs of items, where every one within a run is expected to be very much in line with the rest, but then they move on to the next style.