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Asian Influences on European Decorative Arts

Europeans have always been fascinated by Middle- and Far-Eastern cultures. Even before Marco Polo’s famous trip to China in the 13th century, the exotic and mysterious region stretching from Persia to Japan was the object of intense interest. The systems of government, the philosophies and especially the goods produced there aroused European wonder, curiosity and admiration.

Tea, porcelain, lacquer, silk and many spices were unknown in the West, and as these exotic materials were imported into Europe and America, they became objects of luxury eagerly sought by the aristocracy and later by the emerging middle classes. Although educated Europeans understood the general geography of the Far East, the country of origin of some of the imported goods they admired was not always clear, for the patterns of trade were complex. Goods from China, Japan, India, the Philippines and Indonesia all made their ways to Western markets, and they inspired the European fashion for chinoiserie.

Chinoiserie, a term derived from the French word chinois (Chinese), denotes a type of European art influenced by Asian styles. As the mania for imported Asian objects grew in 17th-century and 18th-century Europe and America, Westerners began to copy and adapt Asian motifs, forms and even methods of manufacture they thought were Far Eastern in origin. Imported goods inspired porcelain production in Europe, and attempts to produce lacquer resulted in a European and American imitation called “japanning.” The Italian Gabinetto (Withdrawing Room) is composed of painted japanned panels imitating Chinese lacquer, while the Commode à Vantaux (Chest of Drawers with Doors) by Adam Weisweiler incorporates authentic Japanese lacquer panels into the chest’s doors and sides.

Form and surface decoration often incorporated visual images Westerners associated with the Far East: pagodas, figures in exotic dress and scenes of tea drinking, to name but a few. The silver Pagoda Epergne by Thomas Pitts is constructed to resemble a pagoda with small silver bells edging the pagoda’s roof. Whether they directly imitated Asian objects or were merely inspired by them, European and American creations embody the Western vision of the Far East. Exotic, sumptuous and often slightly mysterious, these figments of the European imagination often convey a curiously dream-like quality which reflects the European view that Far Eastern cultures were almost utopian in nature.