Illustrated books, prints, and maps from the special collections of the Research Library tell the fascinating story of mutual interest and collaborative works produced by Chinese and Europeans from the late sixteenth to the early nineteenth century. Highlights include a rare series of prints of the European Pavilions of the Yuanmingyuan, called the Garden of Perfect Clarity, designed in the mid-eighteenth century by the Milanese architect Giuseppe Castiglione for the Qianlong emperor. Related works explore Anglo-Chinese gardens, the interaction of Chinese philosophy and Christianity, and the cartography and astronomy of the Belgian Jesuit Ferdinand Verbiest, who redesigned the astronomical instruments at the imperial observatory in Beijing.
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