Langdon warner biography channel

After several field trips to Asia, he returned to Harvard, where he taught the university's first courses in Japanese and Chinese art. The Smithsonian Institution sent him to Asia in , and he spent more than a year there, but World War I interrupted his work. In the Fogg Museum again sent him to China. After several field trips to Asia, he returned to Harvard, where he taught the university's first courses in Japanese and Chinese art.

The Smithsonian Institution sent him to Asia in , and he spent more than a year there, but World War I interrupted his work. In the Fogg Museum again sent him to China. Langdon Warner's work in China is the subject of much controversy among art historians.

Langdon warner biography channel

On the one side, there are those who say that he pillaged sites in Asia of their art, in particular, frescos from the Mogao caves at Dunhuang. Warner first applied the chemical solution strong glue to the painting on the cave wall. He then placed a cloth against it. The cloth was then pulled away from the fresco and then he applied plaster of Paris on the back of the painting and transferred the painting to the plaster surface.

Warner had found evidence that the caves were the object of vandalism by Russian soldiers and reached an agreement with the local people to purchase the frescoes and remove them in order to save them for posterity. Unfortunately, the removal process resulted in some damage to the site itself. Luckily, frescoes he framed with glue but were unable to remove are still on display in the caves today.

Only five of the 26 fragments of murals that he removed are in good enough condition to be exhibited now in the Harvard Art Museums , Cambridge, Massachusetts. Another object of significance removed included a Kneeling Bodhisattva from Cave The views of the Chinese government towards Warner have varied as intensively as the government itself over the last century.

In , the National Commission for the Preservation of Antiquities declared that archeological objects could only be taken from the country if there is no one in the country "sufficiently competent or interested in studying or safe-keeping them. He defended taking fragments from the Longmen Grottoes , saying "If we are ever criticized for buying those chips, the love and labor and the dollars we spent on assembling them should silence all criticism.

Following the bombing of Pearl Harbor in , Warner was impatient to get involved with the war effort. Throughout the war, he was involved with the Roberts Commission as a Special Consultant. His lifelong fascination with Asian art and culture was an invaluable source for the Monuments Men in the Pacific. A trusted liaison between art collectors, museum officials, and art dealers, his reputation alone opened doors and greatly expedited the efforts of the Monuments Men.

In a letter to Roberts Commission headquarters in Washington, D. Two days ago, the Nippon Times broke out a full, two-column editorial on him. Woodhouse became the Acting Director. Warner was born in Ipswich, Massachusetts in He attended Harvard University where he was introduced to the field of archeology by Raphael Pumpelly. Warner was also a member of the Pumpelly-Carnegie expedition to Russian Turkestan.

After graduating from Harvard in , he went to Japan in preparation for a position as Associate Curator of Asiatic Art at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, which he held from to In , he became the Director of the American School of Archeology in Peking, China, and left that position in to come to Philadelphia. Warner established the Museum's Division of Eastern Art in