CUHK and Cambridge museum stage joint painted enamel exhibition in UK
The Chinese University of Hong Kong Art Museum has brought 53 sets of painted enamels to the UK for the first time, in a joint exhibition with Cambridge's Fitzwilliam Museum. The show explores the development of painted enamel in China and runs from October 20 to February 21 next year.
The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) Art Museum has brought 53 sets of treasured painted enamels to the United Kingdom for the first time, in its latest joint exhibition launched with Cambridge's Fitzwilliam Museum.
Running from October 20 to February 21 next year in the United Kingdom, the exhibition explores the development of painted enamel in China, a field that has attracted growing scholarly attention in recent years. It features 89 exceptional works and sets of works, including 53 treasured painted enamels from the CUHK Art Museum debuting in the UK and 36 from The Fitzwilliam Museum.
CUHK vice-chancellor and president Dennis Lo Yuk-ming, who graduated as a Cantabrigian in the 1980s, expressed delight at witnessing and officiating this historic union between the two institutions at an opening ceremony held at The Fitzwilliam Museum on October 19. “CUHK’s founding mission is to combine tradition with modernity and to bring together China and the West,” he added.
Beginning with the transfer of painted enamel technology from Europe to China in the late 17th century, the exhibition traces the emergence of hybrid artistic traditions that developed through interactions between China and the wider world. It offers new perspectives on Chinese painted enamel through the lenses of cross-cultural exchange, artistic innovation and global trade, revealing how Chinese craftsmen working in the imperial workshops of Beijing and the commercial workshops of Canton adapted and transformed the painted enamel technique to decorate objects made of porcelain, glass, silver and copper.
The joint exhibition builds upon the CUHK Art Museum’s acclaimed exhibition “Sparkle and Charm: Canton Enamels of the Qing Dynasty” from 2022 to 2023, which subsequently toured Shenzhen, Tianjin, Shanghai and Wuhan in the mainland.
