Painting Convicts in a pillory
Painting Convicts in a pillory
CC BY-SA 4.0
The sixth picture from an album with torture, court and execution scenes from the Qing Dynasty, showing two seated convicts with their heads stuck in a pillory.
Punishment and court trials were among the most popular motifs for Cantonese artists, as foreign visitors were impressed by the various methods of punishment and torture. They were particularly interested in harsh methods of interrogation such as finger snapping, slapping and hanging with ropes and also paid close attention to the punishments, which ranged from beating with bamboo and tying to a tree stump to execution by suffocation and decapitation for the worst crimes. (NVS)
Place of manufacture: Canton (Guangdong 廣東 )
Material description: paper from Tetrapanex
papyrifera (tongcao 通草) tree, silk
Manufacturing technique: gouache, watercolour
Dimensions: height: 25 cm, length: 38 cm
No. of parts: the sixth of twelve paintings
Current owner: Slovene Ethnographic Museum
Date of the last acquisition: 1963
Last acquisition method: donation
Previous owners and periods of ownership: Ivan Skušek, Jr. and Tsuneko Kondō Kawase - Marija Skušek, National Museum of Slovenia, Slovene Ethnographic Museum
Object condition, handling and damage: The edges of the page are slightly torn.
History of exhibition: Slovene Ethnographic Museum, Ljubljana, 31. 8. 2006–3. 9. 2007 (exhibition Srečevanja s Kitajsko: 200 let slovenskih odkrivanj kitajske kulture [Encounters with China: 200 years of Slovenian discovery of Chinese culture])
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