从 20 世纪开始，中国佛教石窟寺的雕塑遭到严重破坏并流散海外，当时正值政治动乱时期，缺乏官方对文化遗产的监督和保护。国际学者对佛寺与石窟遗址的兴趣及其考察的照片引起了国外收藏家与古董商的注意，结果导致了造像的破坏和流失。
天龙山石窟早期的照片最初发表于1922 年，当时的石窟除了自然风化的痕迹外，原貌仍较完整。不久以后，人们开始凿取造像并运到国外，盗掘活动持续了十多年的时间，一直延续到20 世纪30 年代。本文梳理了天龙山石窟造像通过国际艺术市场流往私人手中或进入博物馆收藏的近代史，同时介绍了一些参与文物买卖和捐赠过程的重要人物以及当时的社会和政治语境。
Introduction: An Early History of Collecting Chinese Buddhist Sculptures
There has been great interest in recent years in museum history, the formation of museum collections, and the personalities involved. The acquisition of a work of art by a museum often involves a series of transactions and figures acting in various roles — as dealers, private collectors, museum directors, curators, trustees, and donors. Particularly, the collecting of Chinese art has received special attention and historical study in recent years with a number of publications that focus on these people—their philosophies, backgrounds, practices, and means of acquisition of Chinese works of art — and on the resulting museum collections of Chinese art in Europe and North America. They have been written from the point of view of collecting Chinese art in the West as an aspect of modern social and cultural history, and the importance to Chinese visual and material culture in the modern Western world.
Already in the seventeenth century, Europeans learned of Chinese arts and regarded Chinese tea, porcelain, and silk as luxuries. A thriving China trade that arose between China and Europe created a huge outflow of financial resources for which the Europeans attempted to compensate through the development of gold and silver mines in the New World and the cultivation of opium in India. The opium trade and China’s objections to the harmful effects of widespread opium addiction to its society brought about war with Britain. One of the results was an event at the end of the Second Opium War that was emblematic both of the declining power of the Qing dynasty and the evergrowing, uncontrollable desire for Chinese art and cultural objects in the West: the looting of the Yuanmingyuan palace in Beijing. In October 1860, British and French troops destroyed Yuanmingyuan and took however much they could carry away as the spoils of war and awarded prize money to the looters after holding an auction at the site. The looted material was presented to the rulers of France and Britain, and was featured in London and Paris auctions with the identification of “Summer Palace” for years to come. A second major event that brought many works of art from China to the West was the suppression of the Boxer Rebellion in 1900 by an international military force that subsequently occupied the Imperial Palace or “Forbidden City” and resulted in further large-scale looting of the imperial collections. By this time, the Hague Conventions of 1898 had created a series of international agreements outlawing plunder, so in the auctions that followed these objects were not identified as plunder taken from Beijing.
After the European victories in the Opium Wars, treaty ports opened up with the establishment of foreign legations and residencies. These conditions attracted increasing numbers of foreigners to travel to China. Many of those who came for work as consular staff, missionaries, and for trade and industry became enamored of Chinese culture and its beautiful works of art and craftsmanship. Some stayed on to collect and sell the art. In America and Europe, the growth of industry and private wealth created a burgeoning market for porcelain, sculptures, and paintings for furnishing the homes of the newly rich. The self-made newly wealthy sought to increase their social standing by building large houses with expensive furnishings and by sponsoring community projects and institutions. Museums provided a place to meet with members of prominent families and opportunities to learn about art, as well as contribute to growing museum collections.
蒋人和 Katherine Renhe Tsiang
原文载《世界3：海外中国艺术史研究》第94—111页
中国学者与佛罗伦萨文艺复兴：伊塔蒂研讨班
Chinese Scholars on Renaissance Studies in the PRC
伊塔蒂别墅，即哈佛大学意大利文艺复兴研究中心，曾举办过一系列研讨班，旨在促进西方艺术与建筑史教学在中国的发展。于佛罗伦萨举办的以“意大利文艺复兴的艺术集合”(2013)和“理解意大利文艺复兴时期的空间观”(2014、 2015)为主题的研讨班，让中国学者有机会研习文艺复兴艺术原作，将对艺术和建筑的研究结合起来，并且同本国和 欧美学者交流在艺术史方面的观点与方法。本文第一部分讨论中国的西方艺术教育；第二部分讨论为中国学者制定的为期三周研讨班的结构。研讨班期间，学者们对文艺复兴艺术和遗迹展开了一周三次的实地研究，力求挑选那些维持原貌的地点。这其中也穿插设置了每周两次的讲座和讨论环节。第三部分则探讨研讨班如何达成三个主要目标：让中国同行了解彼此，感知文艺复兴艺术，接触西方文献和学者。夏季短训班之后，参与研讨班的各位学者也于每年秋季在中国召开的大会上与同行们分享项目心得。
中国的文艺复兴教学
中国的文艺复兴研究提供了一个绝妙的窗口，以此观察西方文化在中国如何被理解，以及如今又以何种面貌得以呈现。约一个世纪以前，文艺复兴的概念甚至为中国学者们提供了许多不同的模型，用以解释和提倡其所处社会中的各种发展。晚清时期，直到王朝末年的1911年， “文艺复兴”一词被译为“古学复兴”(revival of ancient studies)，为那些致力于恢复古代国学的中国人提供了可供参考的相似路径。由于迥异的原因，“文艺复兴”在 1915 年至 1923 年左右成了新文化运动的战斗口号，那时的知识分子强调“重生”概念。
今天，西方学者通常将“文艺复兴”划入“早期现代”，并关注全球艺术史。而中国同行们却对他们称之为“文艺复兴”(中文意为“文学与艺术的复活”)的东西表现出日益高涨的兴趣，尤其是对意大利的绘画与雕塑，而这只是关于前现代西方艺术研究中重要却微小的一环。
研究意大利文艺复兴的中国学者和哈佛大学文艺复兴研究中心伊塔蒂别墅的学者间的对话始于 2013 年，其形式是在中心举行一个为期三周的研讨班，之后还举办了第二期研讨班以及两个会议。第一期研讨班有16位资深学者参加，他们大部分来自中国大陆，还有几位来自台湾地区，这期研讨班在向其他中国学者推广伊塔蒂的各种项目上意义重大，也为 2014 年举办的第二期研讨班做好了铺垫。第二期研讨班有13位更年轻的学者参加。我们认为在读博士生和毕业不久的博士应该是最合适的人选，他们可以将研讨班的理念融入各自正进行的研究之中，且之后的教学工作也会因此受到重要影响。
乔纳森 · K. 纳尔逊 Jonathan K. Nelson
范白丁 译
原文载《世界3：海外中国艺术史研究》第188—214页
海报设计：杨思嘉
图片编辑：姜小艺
未完待续……
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《世界3：海外中国艺术史研究》