The Lure of Blue and White: Chinese Porcelain in Renaissance Paintings

Detail of "The Feast of the Gods," 1514 and 1529, by Giovanni Bellini and Titian. Oil on canvas. National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. (Public Domain)

Around the year 1500, the northern Italian artist Andrea Mantegna painted a scene of the “Adoration of the Magi.” This was a deeply familiar theme to every Christian in Renaissance Europe. Upon the birth of Christ, three wise men from the East came guided by a star to worship him, bringing the precious gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

Working probably for a private patron, the artist places the scene in an intimate setting, portraying the figures in half-length format in a compact space. On the left, Mary and Joseph present the Christ child, who holds up a gesture of blessing; on the right, the three Magi hold up their offerings, facing the Holy Family with vivid expressions of awe, austerity, and joy.

Mantegna’s Detailed Vessels

"Adoration of the Magi," circa 1495–1505, by Andrea Mantegna. Distemper on linen. Getty Center at the J. Paul Getty Museum, California. (Public Domain)

Mantegna was certainly a master at conveying emotion, but he also spared no effort in depicting the costumes and objects. With an eye for details, he clothed the Christ child with an unusual Roman toga, and the Magi with lavish fur coats, jewels, and turbans. Even more diverse are the vessels they carry: one luminous and the other with rippling swirls. The two lidded cups at the back appear to have been made of precious stones, while the opened cup in the front seems to be faithfully in the style of Chinese blue-and-white porcelain, typical of the contemporaneous Ming Dynasty (1368–1644).

(L) Detail of Chinese porcelain from Mantegna's "Adoration of the Magi" next to "Bowl With Lotuses," circa early 16th century. Porcelain painted with cobalt blue under transparent glaze. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City. (Public Domain)

Painting with deep-blue hues, Mantegna took great care in tracing the vegetal border around the rim of the cup. But how did the Chinese porcelain ware make its way to Renaissance Italy? How did artists like Mantegna view the object, and why did he choose to depict it in the hand of a Magi?

Bellini’s Chinese Porcelain

Historians today have gained increasing knowledge of the extensive trade networks during the Renaissance; these brought Chinese porcelain and Middle Eastern imitations to Venice, the major mercantile entrepôt in northern Italy. Furthermore, valuable works of art were also given as diplomatic gifts between Christian and Islamic states. In 1479, for example, the Venetian artist Gentile Bellini was sent to serve at the Ottoman court in Constantinople, where he executed many portraits for Sultan Mehmed II. And so too did the Sultan send gifts and embassies to the West in return.

"Mehmend II, 1430-1481, Sultan of the Turks 1451," circa 1480, by Gentile Bellini. Bronze/Later casting. National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. (Public Domain)

Through such diplomatic routes, Chinese blue-and-white wares were thus brought to Italy, where they caught the attention of observant artists and eclectic collectors. Gentile’s brother, the more famous Giovanni Bellini, copied three large pieces into his “Feast of the Gods,” which he painted in 1514 for the study chamber of Duke Alfonso d’Este in Ferrara. In the palaces of Isabella d’Este in Mantua and Lorenzo de’ Medici in Florence, Chinese porcelains were also recorded among the possessions alongside ancient sculptures and Renaissance paintings.

Little do we know about how Italian artists and collectors viewed these aesthetic objects from far away. After all, “China” was a vague concept—the “Serica” in classical ethnography and “Cathay” in medieval travelogues only referenced a distant land at the extreme end of Asia. The beautiful porcelains, drifting from Ming China to Renaissance Europe, became almost a rootless symbol that pointed aimlessly to the rich and mysterious Orient.

Symbology of the East

"The Feast of the Gods," 1514 and 1529, by Giovanni Bellini and Titian. Oil on canvas. National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. (Public Domain)

In the “Adoration of the Magi,” Mantegna makes a theological argument. The blue-and-white cup in the elder Caspar’s hand may come to represent the wisdom, wealth, and splendor of the East, which journeyed from afar to recognize Christ’s divinity. 

A similar explanation may likewise apply to Bellini’s mythological painting. Here, lubricated by the wine of young Bacchus, the pagan gods revel in nature in the company of satyrs and nymphs, who serve fruits and wine with porcelain, glass, and earthenware. It possibly represents a scene described by the classical poet Ovid, and the Chinese bowls may resonate with Bacchus’s journey in the East—an interpretive association that would have delighted classically educated viewers in Renaissance Ferrara (a city and commune in northern Italy).

But these hypothetical interpretations do little justice to the intriguing paintings, which, without many documentary records from that time, must remain a mystery. In them, figures from biblical and Greco-Roman antiquity engage seamlessly with contemporary objects and a distant Eastern aesthetic. They bear witness to the Renaissance view of a wider, interconnected world, in which Europe gradually emerged to define its own cultural identity.