The National Palace Museum’s Southern Branch yesterday opened a special exhibition featuring artwork from or linked to Okinawa’s historical Ryukyu Kingdom, including a celebrated ink brush cat painting.
The exhibition is to display 154 Okinawan artifacts, including three cultural properties of Japan and 11 prefectural or municipal-level heritage objects on loan, museum deputy director Yu Pei-chin (余佩瑾) said.
The Ryukyu Kingdom, also known as the “bridge to 10,000 nations,” was a hub of maritime trade and cultural exchange for many centuries, connecting Taiwan, China, Japan, Korea and Southeast Asia, the museum said.
Photo: Lin Yi-chang, Taipei Times
About half of the exhibition’s displays are art objects from China’s Ming (1368 to 1644) and Qing (1644 to 1911) dynasties associated with Okinawa, it said.
They include a high-stemmed lidded bowl in gold glaze from the Qing Dynasty’s imperial workshop, an identical version of which can be found in the Yomei Bunko historical archive in Kyoto, it said, adding that the latter was gifted to Ryukyu by the Qing Yongzheng Emperor.
One of the Japanese cultural properties is a three-lugged ceramic vessel with a tricolor glaze of green, blue and brown on the external and interior surfaces, a technique suggestive of Chinese influence, it said.
A red winter tunic embroidered with dragons and a yellow winter tunic embroidered with diamonds — both signifying royal power — are the some of the Japanese cultural properties expected to be displayed later, it said.
The exhibits also include six Okinawa prefectural cultural properties and five Urasoe municipal cultural properties, including the Divine Cat by Ryukyu court painter Soki Yamaguchi, the museum said.
Yamaguchi’s artworks showcase superb lining techniques, subtle colors and vivid expressions of a cat’s gaze and suppleness, marking it as a masterpiece of 18th-century Ryukyu art, the museum cited Naha City Museum of History researcher Yu Suzuki as saying.
This painting is a perennial favorite of cat lovers visiting Okinawa, she added.
The exhibit would be divided into three sections to contextualize Okinawa’s history and culture, the branch’s deputy director and curator Cheng Wing-cheong (鄭永昌) said.
Okinawa’s geography and customs would be showcased in a section featuring maps from the 15th to 18th centuries that depict the extent of the Ryukyu Kingdom’s territory, he said.
Another section is dedicated to Okinawa’s maritime ties with East Asia, with special attention to the Ryukyu Kingdom’s relations with Taiwan, imperial China and shogunate Japan through the ages, Cheng said.
A final section covers the spread of material culture and art, with focus on the kingdom’s outward-looking foreign and trade policies that led to an embrace of diverse influences in culture, art and craftsmanship, he said.
The special exhibition on the Ryukyu Kingdom is to run until Dec. 1, with companion academic conferences on Oct. 4 and Oct. 5, the museum said.
‘DENIAL DEFENSE’: The US would increase its military presence with uncrewed ships, and submarines, while boosting defense in the Indo-Pacific, a Pete Hegseth memo said The US is reorienting its military strategy to focus primarily on deterring a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, a memo signed by US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth showed. The memo also called on Taiwan to increase its defense spending. The document, known as the “Interim National Defense Strategic Guidance,” was distributed this month and detailed the national defense plans of US President Donald Trump’s administration, an article in the Washington Post said on Saturday. It outlines how the US can prepare for a potential war with China and defend itself from threats in the “near abroad,” including Greenland and the Panama
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) is maintaining close ties with Beijing, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) said yesterday, hours after a new round of Chinese military drills in the Taiwan Strait began. Political parties in a democracy have a responsibility to be loyal to the nation and defend its sovereignty, DPP spokesman Justin Wu (吳崢) told a news conference in Taipei. His comments came hours after Beijing announced via Chinese state media that the Chinese People’s Liberation Army’s Eastern Theater Command was holding large-scale drills simulating a multi-pronged attack on Taiwan. Contrary to the KMT’s claims that it is staunchly anti-communist, KMT Deputy
RESPONSE: The government would investigate incidents of Taiwanese entertainers in China promoting CCP propaganda online in contravention of the law, the source said Taiwanese entertainers living in China who are found to have contravened cross-strait regulations or collaborated with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) could be subject to fines, a source said on Sunday. Several Taiwanese entertainers have posted on the social media platform Sina Weibo saying that Taiwan “must be returned” to China, and sharing news articles from Chinese state media. In response, the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) has asked the Ministry of Culture to investigate whether the entertainers had contravened any laws, and asked for them to be questioned upon their return to Taiwan, an official familiar with the matter said. To curb repeated
Myanmar has turned down an offer of assistance from Taiwanese search-and-rescue teams after a magnitude 7.7 earthquake struck the nation on Friday last week, saying other international aid is sufficient, the National Fire Agency said yesterday. More than 1,700 have been killed and 3,400 injured in the quake that struck near the central Myanmar city of Mandalay early on Friday afternoon, followed minutes later by a magnitude 6.7 aftershock. Worldwide, 13 international search-and-rescue teams have been deployed, with another 13 teams mobilizing, the agency said. Taiwan’s search-and-rescue teams were on standby, but have since been told to stand down, as
RSS