This paper studies the influence of 1600-1750 Chinese art and its popularity on contemperaneous European art, and examines the development of Chinoiserie, a style born from the fusion of eastern and western art. According to the previous studies, Chinoiserie was not a legitimate artistic movement and remains categorized in the flippant decorative arts - those arts that did not deliver any transformation in European fine art as an active generative force. However, in contrast to such ideas, Chinoiserie and the so called “China craze” were not just a passing fad in 17-18th century European society, nor was its influence on European art insignificant. Particularly, Chinese ceramics and lacquering techniques, which were absent before they were imported into European society, significantly affected and altered European art and life. Furthermore, even if Chinese influence on the fine arts was relatively limited in 17-18th, examples from Watteau and Boucher shows that Chinese art was surely blended with European art, especially Rococo Style. In this context, this paper intends to shed new light on Chinoiserie as not only the influence of Chinese art on European art, but also more broadly the meaning of the 17-18th century period within the history of East-West artistic interactions
17-18세기 중반 유럽에서 탄생한 동서미술의 혼합양식(混合樣式), ‘시누아즈리Chinoiserie’는 그간 ‘중국풍 미술’ 이라는 모호한 범주 안에 자리하며, 동서미술교섭사적 측면에서의 가치가 제대로 평가되지 않았다. 본 논문은 시누아즈리를 17-18세기 유럽 사회를 잠깐 풍미한 덧없는 유행(passing fad)으로 평가한 다수의 선행 연구들과는 달리, 중국 미술이 유럽 미술에 끼친 광범위하고 직접적인 영향의 측면에서 바라보았다. 이를 위해 중국과 유럽의 오랜 교역사의 면면과 사회·문화적 배경을 살펴보고, 도자기 및 옻칠기법과 같이 유럽 미술에 새로운 매체를 탄생시킨 측면에 주목하였으며, 와토와 부쉐의 경우를 통해 유럽회화에 끼친 영향 등을 고찰하며 시누아즈리의 미술사적 가치를 재고하고자 하였다