Immersing in a celebration of cultural diversity at the Hong Kong Palace Museum
By Alyssa Leong
Some weeks ago, I visited the Hong Kong Palace Museum to see their new exhibit on the historical dialogue and exchange between China and France. I was interested, as this is not a very known subject to most people. It was a sunny day and the museum was impossibly huge, looming in the blue sky. Surprisingly, there were few people around this large, well-equipped space. Maybe the museum hadn’t spent enough on advertising. I followed the directions from the signs and went up an escalator, where I discovered an extremely large sign reading “The Forbidden City and the Palace of Versailles”, with a background of blue sky and part of the Forbidden City’s roof, and that of the Palace of Versailles, to either side.
Architectural differences
Upon entering the exhibition, I was greeted by a room which had three of its walls made into screens. The screens showed videos of Chinese and French architecture, shifting between views of painted ceilings, building fronts, elaborate golden decorations, bronze lions, grand halls full of hanging chandeliers, and more. This highlighted the differences in architecture. While the Chinese buildings exhibited more colorful wooden exteriors in bright reds and yellows, with sculpted depictions of lions and dragons, the French buildings used mostly white stone exteriors, with realistic golden statues of human figures, and large, elaborate water fountains.
Technological exchange
The exhibit contained many artifacts and paintings belonging to the two different countries. One surprising theme was technological exchange in the 16th and 17th centuries. The Kangxi Emperor had an interest in mathematics and European technology, so many technological artifacts were sent to him from France. These included a Pascaline calculator, which was one of the first calculators, invented by French mathematician Blaise Pascal. After this calculator was given to China, copies of it were made. The calculator contained many wheels with numbers written around them in Chinese. Also, there were several drawing instruments of both French and Chinese origin, and there was a protractor sent to Kangxi which was made by Michael Butterfield in France.
Cultural interaction
The exchange between the two countries was not just limited to technology: Culture was also a large part of it, as ceramics, porcelains and fans from China were sent to France. The Chinese objects were much appreciated by French people and were collected by the French court. One example of this was an object originally made as a stool, a common piece of furniture in China, but converted into an elaborate vase by its French owner, through adding golden mounts to it. According to the museum’s information, this conversion of Chinese objects was a common practice in France. These costly modifications served to cover imperfections, making the object more sturdy, and conform to the aesthetic ideas of European owners. In fact, the “Chinese style” became popular in France. Another example was the Porcelain Trianon, a small building built by Louis XIV for his royal mistress Françoise-Athénaïs de Rochechouart. The exterior and interior of the building was decorated with blue and white designs inspired by Chinese porcelain. The French did not know how to make real porcelain at first but over time developed the knowledge. Therefore, the exchanges between China and France could be seen to create new innovations in technology, culture and arts, in both of their countries.
One question loomed, right from the beginning: How were the Chinese and French able to communicate with each other? The museum exhibits did not offer any explanation for this. Right after entering the exhibit, I saw a projection of a letter in French from Louis XIV to the Kangxi Emperor, which contained King Louis XIV’s compliments to Emperor Kangxi’s achievements and expressed Louis XIV’s desire to use a new route to send mathematicians to China. I am not sure how Louis XIV expected Kangxi to read his French letter. I think there were probably translators who learned each other’s language somehow, but I don’t know how they accomplished this because they were completely unable to understand each other at first.
As an RCHK student, I think that visiting this museum is a worthwhile experience. Through the exhibits, we can witness dialogues between diverse cultures over time and learn more about history.
