Palace Paradis - Paper Funeral Offerings from Taiwan

From June 18 to 27 October 2019 at the Quai Branly-Jacques Chirac Museum. 37 quai Branly, 75007 PARIS.

Funeral offerings are among the earliest vestiges of Chinese civilization. The custom of burying the dead with food and everyday objects has been attested for more than 3000 years. The servants, horses, models and valuables found in the tombs are important historical evidence of the lifestyle of the early dynasty, like the famous emperor's terracotta army. Qin Shi Huang (259 to 210 BC). In the Bronze Age, luxurious ritual objects of divination also made it possible to communicate with ancestors, considered as intermediaries between men and deities. Later, from the nineteenth century BCE, Confucianism placed filial piety at the heart of its doctrine and the foundation of social order.
In Taiwan, paper burial objects (zhizha) relate to this long history, while being a local and original art. This exhibition, produced in collaboration with the Taiwan Cultural Center, features creations from two Taipei paper workshops, Hsin-Hsin and Skea. The scenography will seek to highlight the poetic dimension, sometimes exuberant, these ephemeral works, lit and destroyed by the flames.