Wesleyan University
The Mansfield Freeman Center for East Asian Studies
343 Washington Terrace
Middletown, CT 06459-0435 USA
Gallery Hours, 12-4 daily except Mondays
Deep black and beautifully textured, the contemporary Chinese rubbings in this exhibition record distant places and ancient times. By pressing paper onto stone monuments and inking it, the Chinese were able to make copies of important documents before the invention of printing. The process, called "rubbing" or "squeezing" remained important after the advent of printing because of its association with authority and the past. Later, they were collected as accurate reproductions of ancient calligraphy and artwork.