Week 6: Feb. 11, 2024

Pair of Funerary Urns, China, Southern Song (1127-1279) or early Yuan Dynasty (1279-1368), Qingbai ware, Porcelain with iron-painted details beneath a transparent glaze.

Smiling at death….

Everything about these funerary urns fascinated me. First, I thought I was looking at an urn that would hold someone’s cremated remains. Instead I learned that they were buried with the deceased to provide sustenance, in the form of grain stored in the urn, and to embody wishes for the well being of the soul. Thus, the urns are topped by large cranes on the lids, a symbol of immortality. The dragons, however, were considered “intriguing” because they were not specific symbols linked to the death rituals or practices.

What struck me about the dragons is both their joyous expressions - which I attribute to a desire for the soul of the deceased to be without strife or to be free of the troubles or pain of life. But also, they look very modern and childlike. I can fully imagine these dragon characters in a children’s book or cartoon today. Especially the ‘hybrid’ dragon on the left that combines the body of a reptile, head of a cat, and a floral motif across the body! It makes me wonder if the deceased could have been a child.

I set up the photo so that it showed how the two different urns were made and then positioned so that the dragons smiled directly at each other. The shadows of the cranes appear on the wall behind them.

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Week 7: Feb. 18, 2024

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Week 5: Feb. 4, 2024