Asian Art and Architecture

Painted pottery 

Banpo, Shanxi 

4000 BC

Formed by stacking coils of clay 

Used for rice or burial

Painted pottery 

Majiayao 

3300-2000 BC

More painting on the inside of pottery 

Abstract, modern-looking designs

Red pottery and pig-dragon jade, 

Hongshan culture

4500-2500 BCE

Objects for ceremonial/burial use 

Pottery masks with eyes (below) 

Black pottery 

Longshan Culture 

2000-1300BCE

Use of negative space 

Jade Cong (tube) 

Liangzhu Culture

 3000-2000 BC 

Offering to Earth

Jomon (cord-marked) flame vessels, 

2500 BC

Less painting, more sculpted 

Fired outside, slowly at low temperatures 

Almost reminiscent of tree trunks or totems?

Jue (wine vessel) 

cast bronze

Shang/Erlitou period 

 2000 – 1600 BCE

Ding (cooking vessel) 

Cast bronze 

Shang period, 1500 BC

Always has 3 legs, ritual vessel used to cook and serve

Oracle bones,

turtle shell with inscription

Shang (1200-1050 BC)

Taotie (design)

Bronze

Shang 1300-1050 BC

Monster mask-motif with a head but no body, also known as “the glutton”

Fang (square) ding (cooking vessel) with taotie design

bronze

Tomb of Lady Fu Hao

Shang 1200-1050BCE

Piece-mold technique of bronze casting

bronze

Shang (1300-1050BCE)

Bronze human-like head with gold leaf 

Bronze and gold 

Shang period 

1200-1050 BCE

Candelabra

Bronze

Shang (1300-1050BCE)

Zoomorphism, cast in many parts

Bronze Bell

Bronze

Eastern Zhou 5th cent. BCE

Terra Cotta Army of the First Emperor

Qin Dynasty, 3rd Century BCE

Keyhole Grave of Emperor Nintoku

Kofun, 4th Century CE Japan

Haniwa Figures

Clay

Kofun Period, 6th century

Mawangui Tombs

Hunan Province

168BC

Western Han, 202BC-9CE

Jade Burial Suits

Found in tombs of Liu Sheng and Dou Wan

Western Han 2nd Century BCE

Lamp with movable arm in shape of female

Bronze

Western Han, 2nd Century BCE

Wu family shrines,

Eastern Han, 25-220 CE

Chinese pictorial art and confucian ideologies

Que (gate towers/funerary pillars)

Eastern Han 25-220 CE

Great Stupa at Sanchi
250 BCE,

Sanchi, India

carved with jataka stories

Colossal statues of standing Buddha 

Sandstone and mud plaster

Around 6th century

Bamiyan, Afghanistan, Silk Road

Destroyed by the Taliban in 2001

Colossal Buddha with mandorla (full body halo)

Sandstone carving

Wei, 5th Century CE

Seven Worthies of the Bamboo Grove Sarcophagus,

Brick Relief on tomb walls

late 4th century, Southern Dynasties

Tomb of Lou Rui

Northern Qi, 570 CE

with many murals of daily life and animals

Anak Tomb 3 portraits/murals

3 Kingdoms, Koguryo Period, 4th Century,

modern day North Korea

Zhaoling, tomb of second Tang emperor Taizong

Stone horse statues (??) 

Tang Dynasty, 6th Century

Qianling, tomb of Emperor Gaozong and Empress Wu

Stone tomb?

Xian

Tang Dynasty, 7th Century

Takamatsuzuka (tomb), Asuka

stone wall paintings of females, four divine animal

7-8th century Nara

first full color

Admonitions of the Court Instructress

Handscroll murals 

4th Century, Tang Dynasty

Nymph of the Luo River

Rink on Silk

960-1279 (Song)