A Chinese Scene

ca. 1765-1767
Jean-Baptiste Pillement

In the bucolic setting of a fanciful Eastern Asian garden, three characters engage in what appears to be a rite of devotion to the ancestors, as suggested by the bust on a pedestal in the middle ground. Their dress is not so much Chinese as a figment of the imagination. Only the cone-shaped hat of the figure on the left recalls the headgear of southern China near present-day Vietnam, a region engaged in trade − especially the silk trade − with Europe. The building in the background could indeed be a silk manufactory.