Starting from a famous portrait of Emperor Qianlong (r. 1735–96) in the Cleveland Museum of Art, this talk explores the interconnected fascinations of this “art-obsessed monarch” with trompe l’oeil, the full-length glass mirror, and notions of illusionism and metamorphosis. Two special places in the Forbidden City, the Hall of Three Rarities (Sanxi Tang) and the Lodge of Retirement (Juanqin Zhai) provide the best examples to conduct this examination.

Wu Hung is the Harrie A.Vanderstappen Distinguished Service Professor in Art History and the director of the Center for the Art of East Asia at the University of Chicago. He has written numerous books and articles on both traditional and contemporary Chinese art. Among his many awards and honors, he was selected as the 2018 Distinguished Scholar by the College Art Association (CAA) and received an honorary degree from Harvard University in 2019 for his contributions to the arts and the CAA 2022 Distinguished Lifetime Achievement Award for Writing on Art.