Taipei museum to axe Jackie Chan's Zodiac replicas
- By Zhang Rui
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E-mail China.org.cn, September 23, 2016
A set of replicas of the 12 Zodiac antiquities of Beijing's Old Summer Palace donated by Kungfu megastar Jackie Chan will be removed from Taipei Palace Museum's south square.
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Jackie Chan poses with a certificate of donation and one replica from the 12 Zodiac heads at Taipei Palace Museum in December 2015. [Photo / China News Service] |
Museum director Lin Jeng-Yi said the replicas would be removed at the end of September after he had consulted architecture, arts and collectors circles who all considered them as not original "art." At the same time, local cultural workers thought the square should provide space for local art to be exhibited rather than donated works from outside of the island.
"Everyone, from architects, domestic collectors, the art world in general to the media thinks they should be removed," Lin said in a legislative question-and-answer session of Taiwan's Education and Culture Committee on Thursday.
Lin said it was improper to place them at the main entrance of the museum's south branch. The removal will not affect the museum structure as an architect had told him the replicas were only decorations, he added.
They haven't decided where to put the Zodiac heads yet after dismantlement but they would be managed as general property instead of as an art collection, the director added.
Jackie Chan was very selective regarding the recipient of the animal sculptures when he donated them to the museum. He even attended the opening ceremony of the south branch of Taipei museum.
Originally a part of a water fountain in the Old Summer Palace, the bronze heads of the 12 Chinese Zodiac animals were looted by foreigners during the Opium War in the mid-1800s. Seven of them have been returned and are now under the care of museums, but five are still missing.
The star became fascinated after reading about them in 2000. His 2012 film "Chinese Zodiac" was about a team of mercenaries trying to recover the lost artifacts. Chan eventually decided to put together a team of artists and researchers to create replicas of the bronze antiques.
After hearing the news of fate of his donation, Chan stated through his manager that when he donated those artifacts, it was because he thought the museum was an entity that "respects civilization and preserves culture," and he was not just donating artifacts but defending an attitude. Now, "if the museum has different attitude on how to respect civilization and preserve culture, we respect that, too," the actor added.
Another set of the 12 Chinese Zodiac heads are now in Singapore's Asian Civilisations Museum.
The replicas were also caught up in political controversy as two Taiwan extremists sprayed red paint on two bronze artifacts at the end of last year, writing "(mainland's) cultural united front" in Chinese characters, a term referring to the mainland's campaign for reuniting the island.
At that time the museum denied the political background of the donations, adding that the sculptures were included in the new museum building after careful consideration as they represent the universal value of honoring cultural relics and protecting cultural heritage.
However, as the leader and ruling party of Taiwan changed earlier this year, the dismantlement of the replicas also aroused some speculation that it was a move of de-sinolization.
The number of visits by mainland tourists to Taipei Palace Museum has shrunk considerably. A total of 863,540 people from outside Taiwan visited the island in August, down 3.4 percent from the same period last year, according to the island's tourism bureau. The decline was due largely to plummeting numbers of visitors from the Chinese mainland – down 32.4 percent from last year to 248,538.
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