A Ming ventó with European figures

Important South China made lacquered wood ventó of European figures decoration. Of parallelepiped format, its interior was designed to contain a large, and a now missing, shallow drawer. The box, the drawer and the door joinery features are characteristic of Ming dynasty furniture: the edges are rounded, and the panels present half-lap joints of cylindrical wooden pegs; the door comprises of a central panel assembled by mortice and tenon joints, while the frame has four mitre, and mortice and tenon joints typical of Chinese tabletops. Identically to namban ventós, the case rests on a raised frame, resulting from the lowermost extension of its side panels.

            The ventó decoration consists of a thin, semi-transparent layer of brown coloured urushi lacquer, possibly its natural colour, and pigments dyed (iro-urushi) polychrome and textured lacquer (urushi-e), enhanced with maki-e and sprinkled silver dust on urushi. From the four elevations emerge vibrantly coloured male and female figures painted over the splendid wood grain:

On the door front, a youth of wide brimmed black hat, perhaps a shepherd or a pilgrim with his staff, glancing bucolically at two simple flowers; the figure is attired in doublet and green trousers (a “road” colour, used in the countryside or while travelling), tied with a red coloured ribbon of identical shade to the turned top boots and long, sleeveless cassock.

On the right-hand side panel two figures, apparently of lower status and attired in “road costume”. The male, seemingly greeting the female, wears identical costume to the first youth, although with short trousers, red socks and shoes, and holds a bag in his right hand; the red hair, similarly to the other characters, may perhaps identify a new Christian. The woman, almost fully covered as per the demands of contemporary decorum, wears a striped green skirt, long black cloak over the shoulders and white headscarf.

By contrast, the left-hand side elevation portrays a pair dressed in analogous “road costume”, but the courtly variation from ca. 1600; the male sporting a sword and dagger and wearing red doublet, trousers and socks, green shoes and identically coloured and gold trimmed cassock, ruff collar and hat; the female wearing green doublet and skirt, yellow sleeved gold trimmed blouse, broad collar and black veil.

On the rear surface a knight in black hat, red doublet, gold trimmed cassock with buttons, green trousers and socks, tied with red ribbon, and long black gold trimmed ferreruolo cape.

Given the accuracy of the portrayal and of the costume, it is likely that, contrary to the customary depictions of Europeans in namban art, the artist was handed over, by the patron, the printed sources that informed the decorative composition.

Contrasting with most furniture typologies produced in Asia for exporting to Europe, in whose origin, manufacturing, and subsequent regional and international trade via the India Run, the role of the Portuguese was determinant, the ventó emerges from a pre-existent eastern model. It is well known that on the arrival of the first Portuguese to western India, the Konkan and Malabar coasts, furniture was virtually non-existent, being restricted to boxes, trays and the very rich thrones used by the Hindu and Islamic courts. Contrary to India, in eastern Asia, specifically in China and Japan, furniture was widely used, and manufactured in a plethora of typologies, some analogous to the European.

Effectively, types of storage furniture with drawers, like western writing boxes and cabinets, were already common in the Ming dynasty homes of bureaucrats and scholars. One such typology, unknown to the Portuguese cabinet makers, was the ventó, characterised for its small size, easily portable parallelepiped shape, inner drawers, door hinged to the right with lock to the left, and top handle. An intriguing term that, present in contemporary records to refer to Chinese pieces – emerging in such written variations as vento, ventô, bentó or bentô – had its origin, according to Sebastião Dalgado, the author of the Luso-Asiático Glossary, in the Malay word bentoq, meaning "small oriental cabinet".

The historical importance, and the major documental relevance of the herein described ventó, does not simply derive from the rare depictions of Europeans on its surfaces, but also for presenting us with a rare Chinese made object, of which, despite the abundant documental references to such lacquers - some of the earliest far eastern products to reach Europe via Lisbon - there are so very few extant examples.

Although a rather modest object for its small dimensions, perhaps a marriage objet de vertu - produced in the scope of a commission for celebrating a matrimonial union, as it can be deduced from its iconography – evidencing wear and a somehow troubled life, both traits that endow it with added testimonial relevance, this ventó is also a major document to the cultural and artistic exchanges initiated by the Portuguese, during the “globalization” period fostered by the Discoveries.