Measure of Man
I am haunted by an impression left by a fine exhibition at the Musée Cernuschi: ‘Painting Apart from the World: Monks and Scholars of the Ming and Qing Dynasties’. It regards the place of human beings in the world. The paintings are largely scenes from nature, a reminder that sensibility to landscape was alive in the Orient long before it reached Western art. Almost invariably, a human figure, or a cluster of people, is included. But to see this human presence, one has to look for it. Man is given his measure by the world surrounding him. Today, we have inverted this perspective, with disastrous consequences. These reclusive artists of centuries past cast a gentle, beneficent light on the theses of Laudato si’.
A number of the works can be seen online here.
