All language subtitles for Art.Of.China.S01E02.WEBRip.x264-ION10

Narrator:
The Great Wall of China.

The largest man-made structure
ever built.

5,500 miles long,

it's one of
the Wonders of the World.

But it is a paradox too.

Not only a symbol
of Chinese Imperial might,

but of the constant threat
posed by powerful invaders.

You don't build a wall like this
if you feel safe and secure.

The period of strife
and change

that led to
the wall's construction

coincided with
what's now remembered in China

as the golden age
of Chinese art -

from the Song
to the Ming dynasties,

from roughly 1000 to 1600 AD.

For the preceding 3,000 years,

Chinese art had been
overwhelmingly

the art of the tomb
and the temple -

bronze idols,
terracotta soldiers.

But now its subject
was THIS world

and those who live in it.

From an emperor
so in love with art

he forgot to rule his country,

to artisan sculptors carving
ghoulish images from the rocks.

And refined scholars
who fled the imperial court

to find themselves in nature.

Oh, it's so delicate!

This is the story of
how troubled times

can produce great art.

Exquisite porcelain to feed
the guilty pleasures

of an emperor.

Breathtaking architecture

to call down
the blessings of heaven.

Each work of art another clue
to understanding

how this extraordinary society

came to terms
with its own contradictions.

This story of Chinese art
begins here, in the mountains.

The different dynasties
of Chinese history

can themselves be
compared to a mountain range,

and for me,

the highest peak of all,
the Song dynasty.

The first great expressions
of Song art were born amidst

the clouds
and the mountain pines -

monumental landscape paintings.

What a view!

You feel like you're standing
on the top of the world.

The tops of the mountains
are like islands

floating in a sea of mist.

It's the kind of scene
that would have inspired

a great Chinese
landscape painter.

Now, why did the landscape
preoccupy the Chinese mind

for so many thousands of years?

I think it's because,

if you look at the unique nature
of China's belief systems,

each of them places nature
at its very centre.

The Taoist.

The one who follows 'The Way'.

His bible is Lao Tzu's
'Book Of Changes'.

He comes to nature because
he wants to retune his soul.

For him, the natural world is
a macrocosm of the human being.

The trees are nature's flesh,

the rocks are nature's bones,

the rivers are nature's blood,

the mists are nature's energy.

Then on the other hand,
there is the Buddhist.

He comes to nature
in order to disengage himself

from worldly desires.

The hunger for power,
the greed for money, lust.

He comes to isolate himself,
to purify himself.

And then there's the Confucian.

Well, the Confucian comes
to enjoy the spectacle

of the majesty of nature,

but he finds in its rhythms,
in its patterns,

in its order,
in its repetitions,

he finds there a model
for human morality

and human systems of government.

So, at the centre of each of
these three belief systems,

philosophies -
call them what you will -

at the centre of them
lies the natural world.

One of the earliest Chinese
masters of landscape painting

was Fan Kuan.

His 'Travellers By Streams
and Mountains',

a paper scroll painted in ink
some two metres high,

was created in around 1000 AD.

Tiny human figures are dwarfed

by the magnificence
of the mountain.

A daunting wall of cliffs.

Streams of water cascade
to meet a torrent.

This is nature as power,
nature as irresistible force.

Fan Kuan was a Taoist,

a man who followed 'The Way',

wore coarse clothes

and lived in the very mountains
he painted.

Early spring of 1072
is the masterpiece of Guo Xi,

a painter of swirling mist,

who emphasised change,
not permanence.

He saw mountain scenery

as a shape-shifting image
of the universe,

and even wrote a treatise

describing
its ever-changing nature.

Every boulder and tree born
and reborn

in the endless play of light.

His vision of a world in flux

may have been shaped
by Buddhist ideas

about time and reincarnation.

There is one other
great masterpiece

from the 11th century.

Not a vertical scroll
but a hand scroll,

which weaves all these different
elements together

into a story about
Chinese civilisation itself.

This is
'Landscape With Pavilions',

by Yuan Wang Gui.

It was painted in around 1030.

It's an awe-inspiring panorama,
a majestic vision of nature.

Cloud-capped mountains,

but full also
of wonderful little details -

filigree trees, fishing boats,

it's full of weather.

There's mist, there's rain,

there's a little figure
down there...

holding his umbrella,

and you can feel the wind
blowing against that umbrella.

The figures are tiny.

You've got these slightly
bedraggled figures on donkeys,

dwarfed by the mountains.

And nature is immense.

But it's more than just

a depiction of
the natural scene.

I think this is a good example
of how,

when the Chinese painter
approaches landscape,

he often has a form of symbolism
in his mind.

The great mountain peak is...

..as it were, the Emperor,

surrounded by
the lesser mountain peaks,

who are the 100 princes
that pay him court.

So, the landscape expresses
the structure

of human civilisation,

and I think if you see
this whole scroll as a journey,

it takes you from formlessness
towards form,

towards structure.

So, even when contemplating

what seems like the wilderness
of untamed nature,

the Chinese artist
can actually be making

a comment on the true ordering
of society.

But how do you order a society
in the throes of great change?

This is the night market
in the Chinese city of Kaifeng.

1,000 years ago,
this little-known city,

400 miles south of Beijing,

was the capital of China
and the Song dynasty.

Hugely cosmopolitan, as well
as a thriving commercial hub,

Kaifeng, at the time,

was the most important centre
of trade in the entire Orient.

Now, as Europe was stumbling
out of the Dark Ages

into the Middles Ages,

here in China
they were experiencing

a great age of enlightenment.

New discoveries,
new inventions.

Gunpowder, the magnetic compass,

printed money -
and money was important

because, here in China,

while Europe was still locked
in feudalism,

they developed
the first free-market,

truly entrepreneurial economy.

China was vibrant,
but above all, China was rich.

But the man who took control
of this city and China in 1100,

the Song dynasty's
most famous Emperor,

was less interested in commerce
than art.

The eleventh son
of the former Song Emperor,

Huizong had never expected
to succeed his father.

Raised as an aesthete,
not a ruler,

Emperor Huizong was an idealist
who put art before all else.

900 years later,
in modern-day Kaifeng,

they still celebrate
Emperor Huizong's rule.

Aptly enough,
though a modern theme park,

which recreates a painting
commissioned during his reign.

It was created by this man,
Zhang Zeduan.

Early in the 12th century,

he was charged with painting
the Emperor's capital,

which he did
in intricate detail.

His work is now China's
most famous painting.

It's called the Qingming Scroll,

so fragile and precious

that the authorities
only let you examine

a high-quality replica.

And here it is.

So, I'm going to imagine

that I am the Song dynasty
Emperor, Huizong,

who can never go out
into the city that he rules

because he's too illustrious
and elevated for that.

The only way
that he can experience it

is by looking at this painting.

The hand scroll's subject
is the capital Kaifeng.

It's a cinematic representation
of Song society

as it was nine centuries ago.

Essentially,

it's a fantastically intricate
line drawing.

What the artist is interested in
is in detail.

And here we've got
these rice traders.

There they are,
sitting on their bags of rice,

which are going to be loaded
onto these boats

by these slightly misshapen
labourers.

And in the background,

paper money is changing hands.

Paper money -
a great new innovation in China

of the period.

Hogarth would have loved
this painting.

It's full of comic touches.
Look at this!

Here's a boat
that's lost its tow rope,

and all the sailors are
gesticulating rather frantically

at the people on the bridge
for help.

Some of the people on the bridge
are trying to help,

others are just laughing,
some are just gawping.

Disaster may be about to happen,
who knows?

And I love the scene
on the bridge itself.

There's this character
on a sedan chair,

and he's coming up against
a rider,

and they both won't give way.

It's like a Bentley and a Mini
meeting in the middle

and there's road rage.

"We're not gonna give way!"
"No, you give way!"

But for all
its bustling prosperity,

12th-century Kaifeng
was the capital

of a vulnerable empire.

Nomads to the north
coveted the city's wealth,

and Huizong underestimated
their threat.

A man of letters, he put
his faith in words and ideas

rather than weapons,
and neglected his army.

He believed a nation,
like a work of art,

could last forever,

if founded on principles
of reason and beauty.

Kaifeng,
or Bianliang as it was then,

nurtured a great flowering
of philosophy,

poetry and writing,

but it was also central

to the political administration
of China,

as this rather quaint piece
of street sculpture marks.

Confucian scholars, the army of
bureaucrats who ran China,

came from all corners
to this city

to purchase their copies
of the Confucian classics

and to sit their exams
for the civil service.

Confucian ideas about statecraft

spread all the more rapidly
among the educated classes -

the literati,
as they were known -

thanks to a new invention...

..moveable type,

developed in China
some 400 years

before Caxton's printing press
rolled in the West.

Few of Huizong's political
pronouncements have survived.

But you can get a flavour
of his rather dreamy attitude

from a celebrated painting.

Now, this beautiful
little scroll painting,

done on silk,

intended to be read
from right to left...

..was probably painted
by Emperor Huizong himself.

He was a skilled artist.

And it takes us backstage,

so to speak,
into Huizong's palace.

The ladies of the court
are preparing silk.

They're pounding silk,

they're sewing silk,
they're ironing silk.

I like her energy.

She's rolling up her sleeves,

getting ready
for some hard work.

These ladies are sewing.

This crouching woman
with her fan

is fanning the embers of a fire

so that that iron -

looks rather makeshift,
the iron -

piled itself
with glowing red embers,

can be heated up to do its work.

They don't have ironing boards -
they hold the silk taut.

A wonderful sense of energy
in the picture.

This lady is leaning back
to hold the piece of silk taut

as it's ironed.

I like the detail of
this little girl horsing around.

The figures are represented
almost like cartoon characters.

He's got no interest
in the background,

no interest in the detail.

What he's interested in
is the activity.

And the activity...

..is loaded
with ritual significance.

First of all, silk...

The painting's actually done
on silk.

Silk was one of the was one of
the great sources

of Chinese prosperity.

The production of silk was
hugely important to the wealth

of the state.

And as part of palace ritual,
the ladies of the court,

the first day of spring
every year,

they would actually participate

in the processes
of silk production,

silk refinement,
the creation of clothing,

all the way through
to the end product itself.

But at the same time,

it's a very important statement
for Huizong himself of...

..order being observed at court.

Having all the women
of the imperial court

brought together in this way,

preparing
the emperor's new clothes.

In another way, what they're
actually working at

is the fabric of government.

The picture is a demonstration

that everything
within the palace

is functioning properly.

Everything is in order.

And though Huizong isn't in it,

it is, by implication,
all about him and his power.

Huizong used his power above all
to collect pictures

and commission
exquisite artefacts,

still believing
that a perfectly-refined life

on his part

would induce the gods
to protect him

and safeguard his rule.

The greatest monument
to Huizong's devotion to art

and the life of the mind
is not in China,

but here, in Taiwan,

where the National Palace Museum
contains

the greatest concentration
of imperial Chinese art

anywhere in the world.

Nearly all of
the museum's holdings

from the Song period and before

were once in Huizong's
own collection.

Under his reign, ceramics
were to become regarded as art

and taken to new heights.

Simplicity, purity,

austerity, spirituality.

These are
the essential characteristics

of Song dynasty civilisation.

And they are expressed
to perfection

by Song dynasty porcelain.

Look at that beautiful
white Ding ware,

this black ware with the glaze

that seems almost to be bursting
into flames before your eyes.

And here, most beautiful,
most highly-prized of all -

Ru ware.

Ru ware.
There are 73 - only 73 -

of these pieces
in the entire world,

and five of them
are behind that glass case.

Huizong's preference
was for simple forms,

appreciated for
every nuance of colour,

every ripple of glaze.

In the daytime, this museum
is packed with people seven deep

trying to get a glimpse
of these. They are...

They are the 'Mona Lisa's of
the world of Chinese ceramics.

Why are they so highly prized?

Because of the fineness
of this glaze.

Its craquelure has been compared
to that fine cracking

that you see in ice,
also to fish scales.

There's a lovely story about
how this ware originated.

It is said in Chinese legend

that Emperor Huizong himself
had a dream

and in that dream he saw
the colour of the sky

after the rain had stopped
in a clearing.

And he described the dream
to his craftsmen and said,

"Which of you can create me
a ceramic

"the colour of my dream?"

There it is.

During the later years
of his reign,

Huizong became
obsessively preoccupied

with fortune and the gods.

He sent envoys across his empire
to record lucky signs,

or symbols of divine favour -

rainbows,
unusually-shaped clouds,

auspicious animal behaviour.

In 1117,

Huizong requisitioned rice boats
meant to feed his people

and had
these strangely-shaped rocks

transported all the way
from a lake in southern China

to the Imperial Garden
at his palace in Kaifeng.

In Chinese culture, rocks have
the power to bring good luck.

Huizong not only collected
the strangely-shaped rocks,

but he painted them too.

Professor Chow is an authority
on Emperor Huizong

and his troubled rule.

Do you think painting for him

is part of the mental discipline
of being a ruler?

- I don't think
he knew how to rule a country.

He was a great painter.

He was brought to that position

to do things
that he had no idea.

I don't know if he was able even
to manage his household

when he was the prince.

He was not brought up as emperor

or prepared to be an emperor.

He never imagined
he would become emperor.

Instead he was brought up
as a rich man,

as a man with great taste

knowing how to enjoy his life,
how to do art,

how to kill his time.

Instead of managing the country,

he was expecting something
to come down from heaven

to help him.

And when a flock of cranes,

traditionally seen as messengers
of the gods,

landed on the Imperial Palace,

Huizong tried to perpetuate
the moment by painting it.

Not so much a work of art
as an act of denial.

A doomed attempt to keep
the forces of history at bay.

But those forces were already
beginning to turn on him.

For some years,
Huizong had been using silk

to pay off mercenary tribesmen
from the north,

an attempt to protect
his vulnerable northern borders

from invasion.

It was a ploy
that was doomed to fail.

By 1126,

it was all over for the emperor,
whose passion for art

and antiquities had blinded him
to the dangers

towards which his country
had slipped.

Kaifeng was burned to the ground

by his allies-turned-enemies
from the north.

Huizong was taken prisoner

and would die in captivity
nine years later.

The remnants of the Song dynasty
were pushed south

and China fell into a period
of division and violence,

worsened by the deepening threat
of nomads from the north.

The popular art
created around this time

shows just how uneasy
the Chinese felt

during this period of turmoil.

The cave complex at Dazu,

1,000 miles south-west
of Beijing,

contains one of
the most spectacular assemblies

of Buddhist sculpture
anywhere in the world,

much of it created towards
the end of the Song dynasty.

They vividly embody and enact
the nightmares of a generation.

The Dazu cave carvings
reach their climax

in this enormous depiction
of the terrors of hell.

These are the punishments
that await those

who have not shown good karma,

good behaviour in their lives.

They will be reborn
into these tormented existences.

What it shows us are the various
versions of Buddhist hell.

This is the hell of
freezing cold and boiling hot.

You freeze and then
you're thrown into this cauldron

for the demon to stir you.

Look at the flames that lick up.

Stirred with glee by a demon
with an animal's head.

This is the hell
of being sawn in half.

[makes sawing sounds]

His feet are bound to a frame,
he's suspended upside down.

Look at how much fun,

look at the relish
with which he's sawing

this poor, unfortunate,
upside-down sinner.

All of these hells are designed
to speak very vividly

to the ordinary people
of the Song dynasty.

Their own tools -
their carpentry tools,

their agricultural tools -

are the actual weapons that are
being used to torture them.

The style of these sculptures
isn't remotely sophisticated,

refined, elegant.

It's graphic, violent,
almost cartoon-like.

This is popular art.

What hope is there of escape?

Well, the one ray of hope

is to be found
in the upper level of carvings.

Above, you have these ten
rather forbidding kings

who stand for dharma,
for the Buddhist law.

They stand in judgment
over humanity.

The only ray of hope is provided
by the Bodhisattva

in the middle.

It's her mission to bring light
into this darkness.

I have to say,
the overall effect

is of a very little bit of light

and an awful lot of darkness.

Over the next 150 years,

the threat from the north
persisted,

but this time
it was the Mongol hordes,

first under Genghis Khan,

who advanced on the Song forces,

now entrenched
in southern China.

The art of the Song courts would
reflect these troubled times.

Chen Rong's 'Nine Dragons',
created in 1244.

One of the great masterpieces
of all Chinese art.

It's like a bolt from the blue.

This image of mythical beasts,

scaly creatures
with their staring eyes,

fighting the abyss...

doing battle with whirlpool,
tsunami,

flood and deluge.

What's the picture about?

'Nine Dragons'.
Nine, an auspicious number.

The dragon, great symbol
of power, potency, fertility.

It's what the emperor
wears on his robes.

It's what he decorates
his palace with.

It's a symbol of Chinese might.

I think this great scroll,
10 metres long,

is a kind of extended prayer
for help,

for succour in troubled times.

Think what's happening
in 13th century China.

Genghis Khan is on the move.

The Mongol Empire
has been founded.

Theirs is a world
full of threat.

Who's going to win?

The dragon?

Or the whirlpool?

The artist doesn't know.

It was, of course,
the whirlpool.

In 1279, the Song were finally
defeated by the Mongols,

absorbed into what was briefly
the world's largest empire

stretching all the way
from the Pacific Coast

to Eastern Europe.

In that same year,

Genghis Khan's grandson
Kublai Khan

proclaimed himself
leader of a new Mongol dynasty

and gave China the capital
it still has today.

Beijing.
Peking, as it used to be known.

It's world famous,
but how many people know

that it was actually built
by the Mongols?

They didn't want their new city
in the north of China,

close to
their ancient homelands,

to seem like an invader town.

They wanted it to look Chinese,

so they actually modelled it
on a template laid out

in the Confucian classics.

They built a city
in grid formation.

They made some changes.

They did away with
the old barriers and gates

within a Chinese city,

separating one area
from another.

After all, they were nomads,

they liked the free movement
of people,

the free movement of goods.

If you were a fly on the wall
700 years ago,

you might have thought
that it was business as usual

in Mongol China,

but you'd have been wrong.

The Mongols regarded
the indigenous Chinese people

as untrustworthy

and most of the literati -

the scholars who traditionally
ran the country,

were banned
from government jobs.

This meant that artists and men
of letters were marginalised.

Painters and calligraphers
came from the literati class.

But what would emerge
from this adversity

was a spectacular surge
of artistic creation.

This is 'Autumn Boating
On a Maple River',

painted by Sheng Mao in 1361.

The Mongol -
or Yuan dynasty, as it's known -

marked a new dawn
for the literati painters...

the Chinese scholar-artists
who had now become ostracised.

Under the Yuan dynasty,

the intellectual elite of China

felt disenfranchised
and isolated.

They collectively turned away
from the centres of power

in a kind of frenzy of disgust
and retreated to nature.

They literally upped sticks,
left the cities

and moved to the rivers
and the landscapes.

They lived among farmers
and fishermen.

And at their centre was

a charismatic recluse
called Ni Zan.

In many ways
he was contradictory.

Obsessively fastidious,
he washed his hands all the time

and doused himself
in so much perfume

that apparently
you could smell him in a place

five minutes after he'd left it.

And yet,
he spent 20 years of his life

living on a simple houseboat,

devoting himself to painting,
calligraphy and poetry.

He saw all three as aspects
of the same one activity.

And together with his friends,
he invented what was

an entirely new form
of Chinese landscape painting -

the art of misery.

I've come to the Shanghai Museum

to see one of
the greatest examples

of this new kind of art -
an art of self-expression.

It's one of Ni Zan's
scroll paintings

entitled 'Six Gentlemen'.

And it's so precious,
it's hardly ever displayed.

So I have to make my way to
a secure area in the basement

to see it.

My instructions are...

..to wait here.

- Good timing.
- Yes, we are ready.

- You're ready? Fantastic.
- Nice to meet you.

- Nice to meet you.

Hello, I've got an appointment
with Ni Zan.

[chuckles]

Gosh, I feel like
I'm entering Fort Knox.

A Fort Knox
of literati painting.

So, is this the Ni Zan?

Wow.

I can't wait.

We in the West
are used to the idea

of going to an art gallery

and we can just see
its greatest treasures,

like that.

There they are on the wall,
the Rubens, the Van Gogh -

whatever it might be.

Chinese art is not like that.

Chinese scrolls are so delicate,
so fragile,

that many of these works of art

are only exhibited once
every 10, once every 20 years.

So, it really is a privilege
to be able to see

one of the great masterpieces

by the principal painter
of the literati movement.

[gasps]

The painting's title,
'Six Gentlemen',

is a loaded metaphor

for what was going on in China
at the time.

Oh, goodness.

Oh, it's so delicate.

At first sight,
it looks like nothing much.

'Six Gentlemen' -
six pine trees on a mound...

..an expanse of dead space...

..bit of water

and a distant line of hills.

It's a very minimal depiction
of nature.

There's a huge contrast

between this relatively modest,
intimate,

very important, intimate scroll,

this depiction of
an almost nothing,

like an out of the side
of the eye glance

at a piece of landscape,

a piece of dead space,
a piece of hill,

and those great, huge,

monumental depictions
of landscape.

Here, the artist is using
landscape

very much as an expression

of his own emotional core.

And there is...

..a wonderful sense
of these trees almost...

They represent -
they are fragile,

they are slender,
they are in a difficult place.

They have planted themselves
on stony ground

and yet they stand
and yet they persist.

This tree almost seems
to have a human foot.

Can you see that?

It's anthropomorphised.

He painted the same image
again and again

and again and again and again.

This was the image
in his mind's eye.

It stood for his own
determination to persist.

Ni Zan was also a great,
great calligrapher.

And this piece of calligraphy
is as important -

certainly in the eyes
of any Chinese connoisseur

looking at the painting -

it's as important
as the image itself.

It speaks of the origin
of the painting.

It tells us that Ni Zan

was invited by his host
to paint this picture

and he didn't want
to do it because he was tired.

It was late, his host
greeted him with a lamp.

With a lamp.
Very important detail.

So, it's night-time
when he gets to the house,

when he paints this picture,

and yet this picture
is in the daytime.

It's Ni Zan's way of emphasising

that these are images
that come from the mind.

They're not images that come
from the outside world.

The tragic image
of the outcast literati artist,

as characterised
by Ni Zan's six pine trees,

has had an enduring appeal
in China.

[traditional singing]

In the remote countryside,

the Six Gentlemen still
congregate to this very day,

even though their names
have changed,

and some of them nowadays
are women.

The tradition of the elegant
gathering, in which musicians,

poets, calligraphers
and painters

come together
to share inspiration,

is still very much alive.

This is
a collective performance,

where the artists not only
work individually,

but ultimately come together.

In Chinese culture,

writing and painting are two
expressions of the same impulse.

And there's no better way
to understand that

than in one of
these elegant gatherings.

The painter performs his art
using the brush

and the calligrapher performs
her art using the brush

and in a sense, they're both
attempting to do the same thing.

[soft traditional music plays]

See, now the painter has begun
to work on the same sheet

as the calligrapher.

He's using the same brush
and he's using the same ink.

That's very much the spirit of
the elegant gathering as well.

That goes back
to the Yuan period

when the artists got together,

the literati got together
to keep each other company,

to show group solidarity.

That was when this idea began

that they would actually write
on each other's paintings,

paint on each other's
calligraphy.

Each work of art was itself
a kind of statement

of literati solidarity.

Art was a form of self-defence.

Not all artists fled

from the court
of the new Yuan dynasty.

A generation before Ni Zan,

one of the most celebrated
of the literati painters

had created this work,
specifically for the Mongols.

This is 'Grooms and Horses'
of 1292 by Zhao Mengfu.

The image of the horse
calculated

to please China's nomadic rulers
from the steppes.

The faithful attendant,
a self-portrait of Zhao Mengfu.

Seen by some as a collaborator -
a traitor, even -

Zhao Mengfu later regretted
his decision

to serve the Mongols.

He retreated to the mountains,

where his art
would radically change.

Now, together with Ni Zan,

Zhao Mengfu is perhaps
the most celebrated

of the literati
painter-calligraphers

of the Yuan period

and this is perhaps
his most radical masterpiece.

It's called 'Orchids and Rocks'

and it's astonishingly
pared-down.

It's...

..absolutely expressive of this
Yuan notion of scholarly misery.

This is the reject's vision,

the worm's-eye view
of the world.

It's come down to...

..a single square metre of turf.

What's he looking at?

A scribbled piece of rock,
two dead twigs,

brambly twigs with thorns
sticking out of them,

that look almost like scars

stitched into the surface
of the picture.

Some twitching insects,
a few fronds of grass -

that is what the world
has shrunk to.

That's what it's shrunk to
for these rejects from society.

It's a tremendous image.

It's so raw.

It's such
a modern-looking image.

If I didn't know what it was

and I simply looked at it
unseen and blind,

I would guess 1920.

But no, no, no, no.

This is the 13th century.

Zhao Mengfu's paintings
are highly-prized,

but examples of his calligraphy

are venerated like holy relics
in modern China.

This is seen as the handwriting
of the Chinese soul.

Zhao Mengfu's calligraphy
is so precious

that I'm only allowed
a few minutes with it open

and I have to wear
a surgical mask,

which makes me feel
even more like a doctor

standing over a patient
on the operating table.

It's a beautiful piece of work
and, essentially,

it's a short poem, a gift
to one of his closest friends,

and its subject is water,
different kinds of water.

Here, we've got the characters
for 'cloud',

'fog', 'moisture'.

What's wonderful about
Zhao Mengfu's calligraphy

is just how
beautifully expressive it is.

This cursive line
that seems almost

to flow across the page
like water,

the liquidity
of the word 'moisture',

where he's almost allowed
the ink

to get out of his control,

but then caught it
into the gesture

that shapes the mark.

And as he moves across the page,

it becomes ever more flowing
as the water flows more rapidly,

the script flows more quickly

and it ends with this beautiful,
almost dribble of a signature -

Zhao Mengfu.

Zhao and his fellow exiles
identified with water,

ancient Taoist symbol
of resilience.

Cut it with a knife, it heals.

Disturb it,
it always finds its own level.

It's one of the masterpieces
of Chinese calligraphy.

And my time is up.

Thank you for showing me
the Zhao Mengfu.

Xiexie.

Goodbye, sir.

A growing resentment
towards their Mongol oppressors

led to Han Chinese revolts
in the mid-14th century.

And by 1368,

the indigenous Chinese had
finally reclaimed their country.

A new Ming dynasty was born.

With the Mongols gone,

the Chinese rapidly regained
their old entrepreneurial zest.

The merchant class prospered,
exporting goods -

particularly pottery -

across Asia, the Middle East
and even into Europe.

The city of Jingdezhen had,
for centuries,

been the ceramics capital
of China.

But it was the manufacture
of porcelain here

during the new Ming dynasty

which was to give China
its first global brand.

The world couldn't get enough
of this fine Ming porcelain,

created by Jingdezhen's
ceramicists and painters.

But then neither could
the emperor.

The city's defining moment came

when the imperial court
requested the best porcelain

for the ruler of
the Ming dynasty himself

to be made here.

An imperial kiln was constructed
in the city in 1367.

And from its ruins,

archaeologists have retrieved
some truly remarkable finds.

Over the past 20 years, a team
of technicians has been working

with shards of porcelain

recovered from
the imperial kiln.

They've been piecing them
together

like a gigantic jigsaw puzzle.

Not only have
they managed to reconstruct

a number of wonderful porcelain
pots and bowls,

they've also been able
to rewrite

a small piece of history
from the Ming past.

We're looking for
Professor Jiang.

On a wet Jingdezhen morning,
I met Professor Jiang

from the Ceramic Archaeological
Research Institute.

How lovely to be here.

What surprised
the archaeologists is that

some of the perfect
Ming porcelain

had been deliberately smashed.

Extraordinary! Now, tell me
something about these pieces.

For example, this one.

Why was it destroyed?

- So the archaeological evidence
tells us a great deal

about his belief
that what he owned

had to be exclusive to him,

because this is actually
a perfect piece.

There's nothing wrong
with the firing,

there's nothing wrong
with the painting,

there's nothing wrong
with the design.

It's simply that the emperor
wanted there to be only two

in the world and both of them
were to be his.

What they didn't want - the one
thing they really didn't want -

was for the emperor to go
to someone else's house

and see this bowl.

I think my favourite object...

This is my favourite thing.

I'm very intrigued by this.
This is an intact object.

It hasn't been smashed.

It's this perfectly decorated,
wonderful survivor.

It's absolutely exquisite.

It's got birds,
it's got an auspicious crane.

What's it for?

This is...

This is... Oh, that's it.

There's his name on the bottom.

"Created for Emperor Yuanzhang."

And it's...

this wonderful relic
of an entirely bygone age.

If we put the lid back on it,

it's as if we're
putting the lid back on

the world of the Ming dynasty
itself.

The grasshopper-loving
Ming emperor

presided over an age
of contradictions.

80 years before Columbus
and Magellan,

Chinese ships
laden with porcelain

sailed all the way to Africa.

Yet later during the Ming,

trade with corrupt foreigners
was discouraged

by the imperial court -

a Confucian slap on the wrist,

which the merchants
mostly ignored.

Thanks to the merchant class,

theatre and other popular arts
flourished during the Ming -

everything from graphic novels

to boldly-designed
playing cards.

But at court, where the scars
of Mongol invasion

had been reopened
by new wars with the old enemy,

a siege mentality prevailed.

Chinese art had to be elegant,
old-fashioned, safe.

Now, the trick in these museums
of scroll paintings is that

you have to stand quite close
to the glass

and then the light comes on.

Why are we here?

We're here because
I'm interested

in the painting of
the Ming dynasty

and the way in which it reflects
this rather frozen,

bureaucratic attitude to life
that the Ming emperors had.

If the ladies of the court
had their bound feet,

the painters of the court
had their hands bound

because in the Ming dynasty,

you had to be a member
of the Imperial Academy

to work as
a professional painter

and in order to get into
the Imperial Academy,

you had to copy the styles
of the artists of the past.

So look at this.

This is by Dai Jin,

but it's called 'Landscape After
the Style of Yan Wengui'.

He's painted it as a pastiche

of the great Song dynasty
landscape painter.

Here we've got a very beautiful
depiction of bamboo in wind.

Bamboo, that ancient Chinese
symbol of the upstanding,

bending to the wind,
strong follower of the emperor.

Here it's placed in a void
very much in the style

of the Yuan landscapes.

And here, this is by Yao Shu,
sitting alone in the woods,

its subject is melancholy,
misery -

it's Ni Zan all over again.

The trouble is
that Ming art was frozen

in its respect for the past.

It venerated the Chinese-ness
of Chinese culture

to such an extent that it
produced an art of ossification.

Almost completely,
but not entirely,

because it also left space

for an art of dissidence.

Artists who failed
the imperial exams

struck out on their own

and they created this...

Oh, you've got to turn it on
again.

..this wonderful flowering.

Flowering is the right word,

because the subject
is itself flowers,

but look at this.

Isn't that fantastic?

This free, anti-academic,
almost abstract,

expressionistic explosion
of vegetation.

Painted by Xu Wei.

Even his calligraphy is riotous.

Blooms such as these
could never have flourished

in the airless world
of the imperial court.

Just as Western painting
was entering the Renaissance,

Chinese imperial painting
was in decline.

The rulers of the Ming dynasty

expressed their values
most forcefully

not in painting,
but in architecture.

In the heart of Beijing
is the emperor's palace,

the Forbidden City.

It perfectly embodies
the Ming dynasty's

conservative brand
of Confucianism,

enthroning the emperor,
father of his people,

in a daunting citadel of stone.

So imagine you are

a 15th century European visitor
to China

and this is your first look
at the Forbidden City.

You've never seen
anything like it before.

These five bridges
lead you towards

the Gate Of Supreme Harmony.

Everything here is symbolic.

The five bridges stand for
the five Confucian virtues -

filial piety,

respect, compassion,
kindness, etc.

And they cross this canal
which has been artfully designed

to mirror the shape
of a Confucian official's belt.

That side is
the Hall Of Military Excellence.

That side of
the Hall Of Cultural Excellence.

War, Learning -

yang, yin.

All of the buildings
are configured

to reflect celestial harmony.

The five bridges,

as well as symbolising
the Confucian virtues,

stand for the Milky Way.

We've now crossed the Milky Way

and we have entered,
or we are entering, Heaven.

According to Chinese astrology,

the emperor
is the son of Heaven.

The Forbidden City is his palace

and, therefore,
the centre of the universe.

This is the gate that leads us
towards the emperor.

The roofs are yellow.

Yellow is the colour
of the emperor.

No-one else in Beijing is
allowed to have a yellow roof,

and the roof is guarded
by these mythical creatures.

Look at them - one, two, three,
four, five, six, seven

at each level,

who exist both to draw down
celestial power

and to ward off evil.

Every last detail is charged
with symbolic significance.

Look at
these cloud-wreathed pillars.

Look at these images
of coiling dragons.

The roof painted,
every last inch painted.

So this is the gate.

It's only
the Gate of Supreme Harmony.

Step across its threshold
and there

is the HALL of Supreme Harmony.

The Hall of Supreme Harmony -
the emperor's throne room -

is THE destination
for the modern tourist.

But for me,
there's an attic sale feel

about the modern display -

just some old furniture

and other bric-a-brac
in a darkened room.

[speaks own language]

But that too tells
a kind of truth about this place

as the epicentre
of the Ming dynasty,

a dynasty that expended
much effort

on pretending to be
more all-powerful

than it actually was.

The Forbidden City
is magnificent,

but its architecture is the
architecture of wish fulfilment,

designed to protect an emperor

who ultimately
could not be protected,

and to keep at bay powers
that could not be resisted.

Which brings us back full circle
to the Great Wall.

The wall, too, was completed
under the Ming dynasty,

and is itself very much
a reflection

of the anxieties of the time.

It's come to stand, I think,
in the public imagination

as a great symbol
of China's imperial sense

of its own impregnability.

But in fact... [laughs]

..it's actually the largest
confession of weakness

ever built.

It was breached on hundreds
of occasions, and eventually,

China fell again to another
invader from the north,

the Manchu,

who formed the last of
the nation's great dynasties,

the Qing.

And so the pattern
of Chinese history,

so vividly reflected in its art,
repeated itself once more,

sometimes inward-looking,

sometimes responding
to the shock of invasion.

But the greatest threat of all
still lay far beyond the borders

marked out by the wall

in what we now simply call
'the West'.

And what happened when China
met the West?

Well, that's another story.

Captioned by Ai-Media
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