Japan, Scenes of traders in Nagasaki, Mid-18th century, Nagasaki pair of hand scrolls, opaque watercolour, ink and gold on paper; box, wood, paper and ink. M.J.M Carter AO Collection through the Art Gallery of South Australia Foundation 2014. Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide.  

ADELAIDE.- Treasure Ships: Art in the Age of Spices at the Art Gallery of South Australia in June and at the Art Gallery of Western Australia in October is the first exhibition in Australia to present the complex artistic and cultural interaction between Europe and Asia from the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries – a period known as the Age of Spices. 

This exhibition includes almost 300 outstanding and rarely seen works of ceramics, decorative arts, furniture, metalware, paintings, prints, engravings and textiles from both public and private collections in Australia, India, Portugal, Singapore and the United States.  

Australia, Kangaroo, c.1845, south-east Adelaide Hills, South Australia, casuarina, iron, glass eyes, plaster, 56.0 x 25.0 x 8.5 cm; Gift of Dr Robert Lyons through the Art Gallery of South Australia Foundation 2014, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide.

Nick Mitzevich, Director, Art Gallery of South Australia said this landmark exhibition and its publication highlights the Gallery’s international reputation for presenting spectacular exhibitions of historical Asian and European art. Treasure ships showcases a diverse collection of luxury objects, many of which have never previously been seen on public display in Australia. This has been made possible through the extensive cooperation and support the Gallery has received from institutions, collectors and scholars in Portugal, India, Singapore, Indonesia and the United States, as well as the partnership with the Art Gallery of Western Australia. The Gallery’s two curators James Bennett and Russell Kelty have worked researching the exhibition for over 3 years and their professional commitment has ensured the success of this much anticipated exhibition. 

China and Europe–Japan, Surcoat [jinbaori], with mon, late 18th century with 19th-century repairs, brocade created in China, velvet and factory print created in Europe, possibly France, garment constructed in Japan, cotton, wool, silk, velvet, metallic thread, natural dyes, supplementary weft and plain weave, wood, 101.0 x 85.0 cm; Helen Bowden Gift Fund 2015, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide.

The works reveal how the international trade in spices and other exotic commodities inspired dialogue between Asian and European artists, a centuries old conversation whose heritage is the aesthetic globalism we know today. 

Europe’s infatuation with pepper, nutmeg and cloves has often been explained as the ingredients necessary to preserve cooked foods in the days before the invention of refrigeration. This is a half-truth which takes little account of the complex reasons the condiments of luxury and status were so avidly sought, often at great expense to human lives said James Bennett, Curator. 

 Ichiryusai (Utagawa) Yoshitoyo, Japan, 1830–1866, On display in West Ryogoku [Nishi ryogoku ni oite kogyo]: Leopard, July 1860, Tokyo, colour woodblock print on paper (nishiki-e), 34.0 x 24.0 cm. d’Auvergne Boxall Bequest Fund 2014, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide. 

The exhibition commences with the small country of Portugal. Located on the periphery of Europe, Portugal re-mapped the West’s view of the world and created a mercantile spice empire stretching halfway around the globe during the fifteenth-sixteenth century. In 1498 Vasco Da Gama’s small fleet became the first European ships to reach India and landed with the famous words, ‘we come in search of Christians and spices’. Within a decade the Portuguese soldier –aristocrat Francisco de Almeida (1450-1510) had ruthlessly seized control of the Indian Ocean spice trade and established Portugal’s permanent presence in Asia which was to last four hundred years. 

India or Indonesia, Jewellery box, from the collection of Queen Adelaide, 1792-1849.

Treasure Ships also presents the story of exploration and trade, discovery and shipwrecks, as well as illustrating the astonishing beauty of Chinese porcelain, known as ‘white gold’, and vibrant Indian textiles created for export around the world. 

There are several highlights in this exhibition including two works from the personal collection of Queen Adelaide (1792-1849) after which the city of Adelaide was named in 1836, artefacts retrieved from the Batavia, which sank off the Western Australian coast in the seventeenth century and a magnificent early 19th century Chinese punchbowl depicting Sydney Cove, that locates Australia within this global history. 

India, Infant Jesus, Saviour of the World, 17th century, Basilica of Baby Jesus, Old Goa, Goa. Ivory, 88.0 x 20.5 cm; Museum of Christian Art, Goa, Inv. 01.1.109. 

It is most appropriate that this exhibition should originate in Adelaide as this is the only Australian city founded on the vision of a Eurasian – the surveyor Colonel William Light (1786-1839) whose Mother was of Malaysian descent and whose remarkable self-portrait features in the exhibition said James Bennett. 

Treasure Ships also examines the impact of the Age of Spices on the ‘discovery’ of the Australian continent and the commencement of English occupation in 1788. The colonial art of the period displays the aesthetic reverberations that continued in the Australasian region long after European ships had ceased carrying cargoes of nutmeg and cloves. 

Treasure Ships: Art in the Age of Spices opened at the Art Gallery of South Australia 13 June – 30 August 2015 and at the Art Gallery of Western Australia 10 October – 31 January 2016.

India, Portrait of D. Francisco de Almeida, 16th century, Goa, oil and tempera on wood, 183.0 x 98.0 cm; National Museum of Ancient Art (Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga), Lisbon, MNAA Inv 2145 Pint.

India, Reliquary monstrance, for thorn from the Crown of Christ, 17th century, Basilica of the Baby Jesus, Old Goa, Goa, gilt silver, glass, 48.5 x 24.0 x 18.0 cm; Museum of Christian Art, Goa, Inv. 01.1.12.

India–Spain, Trinitarias carpet, early–mid-17th century, northern India, found in Madrid, Spain, wool pile, cotton warp and weft, 1044.0 x 336.5 cm; Felton Bequest 1959, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne , NGV 91–D5.

Visscher Netherlands, 1552–1622, Islands of Maluku … [Insulae Moluccae …], 1617, Amsterdam engraving on paper, 39.0 x 55.0cm, Kerry Stokes Collection, Perth.

Japan, Dutch trading ship in Japanese waters, c.1870, four-panel screen, opaque watercolour, ink and gold on paper, 67.5 x 138.0 x 11.0 cm; Kerry Stokes Collection, Perth, 2006.004. 

Japan, Portable altarpiece, with devotional image, late 16th–early 17th centuries, wood, urushi lacquer, gold lacquer, mother-of-pearl and gilt copper (fittings), pigment on wood (painting), 37.5 x 29.2 x 5.1 cm; Museu do Oriente/Fundação Oriente, Lisbon, Portugal, FO/0636. photo: Hugo Maertens/BNP Paribas.

Japan, The arrival of a Dutch ship at the port of Nagasaki in 1641 [Het gezicht van aankomst der Hollansche scheepen in de haven van nangazakie: Oranda fune nyushin no zu], 1800, Nagasaki; printed by Bunkindo, colour woodblock print on paper (nishiki-e), 30.0 x 40.0 cm; The Gwinnett Collection, Adelaide.

Portugal, Reliquary cross of St Francis Xavier, first half 17th century, silver, 36.0 x 18.5 cm; National Museum Machado de Castro, Coimbra, MNMC 6210.

Portugal, Salver, 1520–40, silver gilt, 46.5 cm (diameter); National Museum Machado de Castro, Coimbra, MNMC 6092A.