The term "Chinoiserie" is french for "chinese-like". This type of asian/chinese
design style entered Europe in the mid-to-late 17th century, when explorers were
importing chinese artifacts into Europe and were astounded by the beauty of these
hors-d'oeuvres and their design/style. The construction and fabrication of many
things and merchandise in Europe would be shortly after influenced by Chinoiserie
Obviously, you can see why I decided to create my blog on chinoiserie.
I'm deeply interested in this artistic form of design. The beauty, the delicacy, the
texture of the materials, as well as the interest I personally take within each shape.
China has been, and still is a highly respected and admired country. Its
empires have highly and nicely preserved China's cultural values, wether it be
China's religion, artifacts, art, music, architecture, clothing, and off course, its
people.
Chinoiserie, before it left China, influenced other surrounding asian
countries to use this art-form as their main dominant style. The asian
countries involved in this Chinoiserie "mass domination" include Vietnam,
Korea (north and south), Indonesia, Burma, Japan, and among many other
countries in the asian continent.
This is an example of Chinoiserie. A fan artistically made
and designed, as you can see. The writing on the black wooden
part of the fan filled with gold leak, as well as the artwork on the
fan canvas of a cherry blossom tree (Sakura tree).
As most of you know, even chinese calligraphy is considered
as an art-form; mere chinese writing! Once again, many asian countries
have adapted this type of calligraphy as a symbolic and artistic for of
media throughout the ages.
An off course, my favorite form of chinoiserie: weapons. Japan was
one of the main countries in the 17th century to use weapons of this sort.
Chinoiserie weapons weren't only unusual and deadly, but they were far
more advanced and unbelievably engineered than any other weapons in the 17th century. For example, the shuriken projectile above looks beautiful, and in some cases exotic; yet each blade is point sharpened. These projectiles were engineered to land point first when thrown. I'm a huge enthusiast of chinoiserie weapons. I legally own 2 sets of 4 shuriken like these, an O Tanto (japanese long dagger) a wakizashi ( japanese short sword, longer than the O Tanto) a katana (traditional samurai 2-handed sword) throwing needles and a fan used for distraction. I collect these items with no intention to use them.
