China and the West

Chambers, William. Designs of Chinese buildings, furniture, dresses, machines, and utensils [ID D1838].
Preface by Samuel Johnson : "It is difficult to avoid praising too little or too much. The boundless panegyricks which have been lavished upon the Chinese learning, policy, and arts, shew with what power novelty attracts regard, and how naturally esteem swells into admiration. I am far from desiring to be numbered among the exaggerators of Chinese excellence. I consider them as great, or wise, only in comparison with the nations that surround them ; and have no intention to place them in competition either with the antients, or with the moderns of this part of the world ; yet they must be allowed to claim our notice as a distinct and very singular race of men ; as the inhabitants of a region divided by it's situation from all civilized countries ; who have formed their own manners, and invented their own arts, without the assistance of example".
Chambers then went on to point out that no accurate designs of Chinese buildings had yet appeared in Europe, and that his plates "might be of use in putting a stop to the extravagancies that daily appear under the name of Chinese, though most of them are mere inventions, the rest copies from the lame representations found on porcelain and paperhangings".
Das Buch enthält ein chinesisches Gedicht, dessen Übersetzung und Bedeutung Chambers nicht kannte. Die Verse gehören zu den Chinoiserien, die er von seinen Reisen aus Südchina mitbrachte. Er schreibt : "Ich hab mir viele dieser Inschriften aus China mitgebracht, aber ich habe vergessen, sie mir erklären zu lassen". Chambers gebrauchte die chinesischen Schriftzeichen als Symbol für das Exotische überhaupt. Die Zeichen sollten als Symbol für chinesische Kultur verstanden werden, das hier in einem leicht kopierbaren Muster vorlag. Sämtliche in seinen verwendeten Schriftverzierungen entstammen diesen Gedichtsstrophen. Das 'Chinesische' sollte wie ein Sinnbild für die von ihm geforderte Wirkung von Mannigfaltigkeit aufgefasst werden, wobei der Gartenkünstler "die Unzulänglichkeit der Natur ersetzen muss".

Sekundärliteratur

R.C. Bald : Chambers had no intension of advocating or encouraging the use of Chinese architecture on any large scale in Europe, although it might have a place “in extensive parks and gardens, where a great variety of scenes are required”, and in “the inferior apartments of immense palaces”. The designs of Chinese furniture would be helpful to English cabinet-makers, and even the drawings of Chinese costumes would "be useful in masquerades, and other entertainments of that kind, as well as in grotesque paintings".
Chalmers believed, Englishmen could learn from having the correct Chinese model before them. "The Chinese excel in the art of laying out gardens". "Their taste in that is good, and what we have seen for some time past been aiming at in England, though not always with success. I have endeavoured to be distinct in my account of it, and hope it may be of some service to our Gardeners."
Plate VI illustrates two delightful garden pavilions, one from an island in a lake, and plate VII shows a bridge from the garden of a Cantonese merchant. Included in plate IX is a courtyard garden with its moon-gate, lattice-windows, rockery, bamboo arbour, and lotus pool.
In his essay Chambers successfully emphasizes the two features in the gardens of the Chinese which still seem strangest to Europeans : their characteristic but completely unfamiliar use of rockery and their extreme fondness for water. Chambers not only expresses his admiration for the skill with which they managed streams and cascades in their gardens, but also realizes that "in the small ones, if the situation admits, they frequently lay almost the whole ground under water ; leaving only some islands and rocks".

David Porter : Chambers continually wavered in his expressions of commitment to the Chinese style, a fact that suggests he was acutely aware of the problems posed by his divided aesthetic loyalities, but which also makes it difficult to assess the true nature and depth of his interest in China. This ambivalence first appears to his Designs of Chinese buildings. On the other hand, he seems genuinely to admire Chinese architects for their originality and for the 'singularity, justness, simplicity, and beauty' of their creations, going so far as to note certain resemblances with structures of classical antiquity. Yet on the other hand, he feels compelled, at least in part by concerns for his reputation, to disclaim any intent 'to promote a taste so much inferior to the antique', and ultimately dismisses the Chinese buildings whose designs fill his volume as mere curiosities and 'toys in architecture'. This equivocation reflects, in part, a contemporary ambivalence in Britain toward the much vaunted achievements of Chinese civilization. Chambers was stepping out on a limb, in his defense of Chinese design, and it is not at all surprising that he felt obliged to temper his praise.