This paper will focus on the pictorial representation of blind people during the Qing dynasty, ex... more This paper will focus on the pictorial representation of blind people during the Qing dynasty, exploring the circulation and meaning of these images. Even though village scenes that include blind street musicians already appeared during the Song dynasty – often considered as the golden age of genre painting, it was in fact not until the late seventeenth century that these characters started to be treated as an independent theme in pictorial art. Two distinct sub-genres seemed to have emerged that depict the figures in comic or absurd situations including: blind musicians in the middle of a fight and blind beggars and entertainers dressed as scholars and enjoying antiquities, playing musical instruments, and drinking. Focusing on a neglected group of works produced mainly in Yangzhou, this paper aims to explore the function, meaning and audience of these paintings in particular, so as to reconsider the nature of genre painting (in general) by examining the flourishing of the comic and satirical modes in the specific context of Qing China. I will argue that, far from being simply intended to ridicule blind people themselves, these images rather target the literati or the newly risen merchant class trying to mimic the literati way of life, those people blinded by power and glory and fighting each other for fame and profit. By so doing, the painters are not merely condemning and criticizing these categories of people. In fact, the hope of reforming societal evils underlines in these bitter commentaries.
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