Treasures from the Palace of Versailles outside Paris and The Palace Museum in The Forbidden City in Beijing —both Unesco World Heritage sites—will go on show at the Hong Kong Palace Museum next month (18 December-4 May 2025).
The exhibition, The Forbidden City and The Palace of Versailles: China-France Cultural Encounters in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries, will throw new light on the burgeoning Sino-French exchanges that flourished under different French monarchs and Chinese emperors, highlighting “a period of significant cultural and artistic exchange between the two nations”, say the exhibition organisers.
The show marks the 60th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between France and China, prompting the joint cultural bonanza which also resulted in a similar exhibition held at the Palace Museum, Beijing, earlier this year. However, according to a spokesperson for Hong Kong’s palace museum, this exhibition’s design and objects will be different.
The exhibition in Hong Kong explores how Louis XIV of France (r. 1643-1715) reached out to his contemporary Emperor Kangxi in China, sparking a range of cultural and economic partnerships. “Despite the vast geographical distance between the two imperial palaces and the fact that the rulers of the two nations never met, the royal courts held immense curiosity for one another,” says an exhibition statement.
Louis XIV’s decision to dispatch six Jesuit missionaries as “King’s Mathematicians” to China was also far-reaching. The Jesuits successfully carried out their mission and reported back to the king everything they discovered in China, adds a statement from Versailles.
This mutually conducive relationship continued under successive monarchs and their spouses. Marie Leszczyńska, the queen consort of Louis XV (r. 1715-1774), created a “Chinese Chamber” in her private apartment in Versailles. “Political and intellectual links between France and China forged in the 17th century ushered in a true golden age for Franco-Chinese diplomatic relations, which lasted until the French Revolution,” says the Versailles statement.
Silver jug, Qing dynasty, Kangxi period, about 1680.
The Palace of Versailles/Christophe Fouin
More than 150 works will be displayed across four sections covering scientific and diplomatic exchanges along with craftsmanship and innovation. Key objects include a Silver Jug (around 1680) made in Guangdong, southeast China, and presented as a gift to Louis XIV by a Siamese envoy in 1686. In 1793, the jug was saved from destruction by the post-Revolution government in France.
The Palace Museum is loaning a Pascaline calculator made of gilded copper dating from the Qing dynasty (Kangxi period, 1661–1722) along with a lurid Chrysanthemum Pot (1783) made by the French enameller Joseph Coteau. Crucially the Hong Kong Museum is planning to host a scholarly workshop late next year where experts will present the latest research on Sino-French cultural exchange of the era.
Blockbuster shows drawn from overseas institutions are proving popular in Hong Kong. Botticelli to Van Gogh: Masterpieces from the National Gallery, London, which ran at the Hong Kong Palace Museum from November to April this year, attracted around 240,000 visitors.
