The Female Audience: Modeling Idealized Femininity

208 Chapter 4 Chapter 4 The Female Audience: Modeling Idealized Femininity All of the paintings discussed thus far seem to have been collected and viewed primarily by men, judging from the evidence of seals and inscriptions. An indi- vidual man might have projected himself as a participant in the pictured nar- rative of heteroerotic desire, comparing his own situation to the story. But what would happen if a woman viewed these paintings? Was she meant to identify with one of the women depicted as expressing longing or desire (as Mary Ann Doane proposes in her analysis of a different visual art form and a much later culture)?1 Analysis of a sixth-century palace-style poem in which a court lady contemplates a visual image of a beautiful woman suggests that Chinese women, at least at that time, were also expected to identify with mod- els of idealized femininity.2 Men used Song examples of shinü hua as vehicles for expressing opinions on a range of topics; I propose that women could do the same. Although the most obvious function of those examples of shinü hua that depict themes of longing and desire was to please the male viewer, this does not mean that women could not appreciate such paintings. Other Song paintings of women did find a female audience, and one of their functions was to model a particular vision of femininity: for example, the different versions of the Classic of Filial Piety for Girls likely served as important components of a courtly woman’s Confucian education, following in the tradition of earlier paintings such as Admonitions of the Court Instructress to the Palace Ladies and Exemplary Women.3 In addition, women did demonstrate interest in themes of 1 Mary Ann Doane, “Film and the Masquerade: Theorising the Female Spectator,” Screen 23, no. 3/4 (September/October 1982): 78. 2 Paul Rouzer’s translation and analysis of Yu Jianwu 庾肩吾 (487–550), “Yong meiren zi kan hua yingling 詠美人自看畫應令 [A Beauty Sees Herself in a Painting],” YTXY, 8.7b, is infor- mative, though elsewhere he writes that erotic subjects were likely not intended for women; Rouzer, Articulated Ladies, 151, 289. 3 Murray, “Didactic Art for Women,” 27–28. Hui-shu Lee speculates that the Beijing Palace Museum version of the Classic of Filial Piety for Girls (Nü xiaojing tu 女孝經圖, handscroll, light color on silk, 43.8 × 823.7 cm) may have been associated with Empress Wu, the consort of Emperor Gaozong of the Southern Song; Lee, “The Emperor’s Lady Ghostwriters,” 73–74. The Beijing paintings are reproduced in Zhejiang Daxue Zhongguo gudai shuhua yanjiu zhongxin 浙江大學中國古代書畫研究中心, Song hua quanji 宋畫全集 [Complete © Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2018 | doi 10.1163/9789004369399_006 The Female Audience 209 desire. At the Southern Song court, the empress Yang Meizi 楊妹子 (1162–1232) collaborated with court painter Ma Yuan 馬遠 (fl. ca. 1194–ca. 1222)4 to create compositions designed to strengthen her relationship with her husband, Emperor Ningzong 寧宗 (r. 1194–1224), writing poetry for their paintings of flowering branches. In one instance, she inscribed Ma Yuan’s painting of apricot blossoms with a couplet comprised of highly suggestive imagery: Receiving the wind, she presents her unsurpassed beauty, Moistened with dew, she reveals her red charms. 迎風呈巧媚，浥露逞紅妍。 The composition functions as an intimate message for Ningzong;5 given Empress Yang’s use of such images to fortify her own position, though, one must understand this pairing of painting and poetry as exceeding the simple expression of her feelings. With paintings such as this in mind, it seems en- tirely possible that by the Southern Song, women too appreciated paintings that represented their longings and desires through female figures. Although it is difficult to recover evidence of women’s encounters with shinü hua, in this chapter I turn to paintings that may well have been primarily enjoyed by women. None has documentation that connects it to a female viewer, but the format and content of each allow for some speculation on this point. The first three paintings that I discuss are fans that depict pensive women in secluded gardens. The theme of each clearly derives from erotic poetry and effectively represents a woman’s longing for an absent man. The fourth painting shows multiple women, again in a garden setting, and was once mounted as a screen. This painting appears to represent a story of the Collection of Song Painting], 8 vols. (Hangzhou: Zhejiang Daxue chubanshe, 2008–10) 1, part 5: 186–215. Hui-shu Lee notes that the Admonitions scroll bears Empress Wu’s seal in Empresses, Art, and Agency, 128. 4 Dates for Ma Yuan’s period of activity were not recorded. I propose ca. 1194 for the beginning of Ma Yuan’s activity as a painter—corresponding to the beginning of Ningzong’s reign—and an end date of approximately 1222, based on the date of his Twelve Views of Water. For discus- sions of his dates and reproductions of Twelve Views of Water, see Richard Edwards, The Heart of Ma Yuan: The Search for a Southern Song Aesthetic (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2011), 2–3, pls. 22a-l. 5 Lee, Empresses, Art, and Agency, 170 (her translation), 196–97; the painting is Ma Yuan, Apricot Blossoms, National Palace Museum, Taipei, and Lee reproduces it in fig. 4.2. For more on Empress Yang, see idem., “The Domain of Empress Yang (1162–1233): Art, Gender and Politics at the Southern Song Court” (Ph.D. diss., Yale University, 1994)..

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