Figure Item Number: Edz941 from the MOA: University of British Columbia
Description
Multicoloured rice flour paste figure of Kuan-ti with spear halberd at his back of paste over bamboo sticks, carrying a book in his left hand. Cracked due to drying and partially eaten by insects. Mounted on a bamboo stick.
History Of Use
This figure is intended to be used as a child's toy or household ornament, not as an object of worship (collector).
Cultural Context
used primarily by children
Iconographic Meaning
Kuan Ti, derived from an historic personage, is god of war and literature. Kwan Ti is often known as Kwan Kung. His attributes of a weapon and a book indicate his special powers.
Specific Techniques
Hand-formed by shaping, rolling, incising, and combing the malleable paste, while selecting the various colours as needed and then adhering the finished shapes to each other and to the bamboo stick that supported the figure and served as a handle. The only tools used were a piece of bamboo and a broken comb.
Narrative
The maker was a very elderly man who made and sold these figures while sitting at the side of a road in Tsuen Wan. He always attracted a large audience of interested people. The artist said that he received his training in Shandong Province, which is in northeast China. The collector, Elizabeth Johnson, never saw any other such artist. There is a photograph of him at work in the documentation file for accession 328 at the Museum of Anthropology.
Item History
- Made in Tsuen Wan, Hong Kong, China before 1976
- Collected during 1976
- Owned by Elizabeth L. Johnson before September 2, 1976
- Received from Elizabeth L. Johnson (Donor) on September 2, 1976
What
- Name
- Figure
- Identification Number
- Edz941
- Type of Item
- figure
- Material
- rice flour paste adhesive, bamboo grass and aniline dye
- Manufacturing Technique
- formed
- Overall
- height 30.5 cm, width 9.0 cm, depth 4.5 cm
Who
- Culture
- Chinese
- Previous Owner
- Elizabeth L. Johnson
- Received from
- Elizabeth L. Johnson (Donor)
Where
- Holding Institution
- MOA: University of British Columbia
- Made in
- Tsuen Wan, Hong Kong, China
When
- Creation Date
- before 1976
- Collection Date
- during 1976
- Ownership Date
- before September 2, 1976
- Acquisition Date
- on September 2, 1976
Other
- Condition
- fair
- Accession Number
- 0328/0046