7
From the collection of Victoria and Albert Museum
The Great Square before the Factories, Canton is a 7 by George Chinnery, a Romanticism work, held at Victoria and Albert Museum.
George Chinnery drew this scene in 1826. It shows the busy square near the Pearl River in Canton, where Western traders worked. The drawing captures crowded stalls and buildings like the English and Dutch factories. A key detail: the Cantonese merchant Liu Tung’s building had a pavilion that was later removed after his bankruptcy. The square was a busy spot for trade and people. Check out the Victoria and Albert Museum for more works like this.
A view from the west of the European and American trading bases known as "factories" or "hongs" along the Pearl River in Canton (Guangzhou), the sole Chinese port open to Western trade at the time, with the prominent building topped by a pavilion occupied by merchant Liu Tung, later bankrupted and imprisoned, and the porticoed "English factory" marked by an American flagstaff. The "Dutch factory" appears to its right, while the area between the buildings and the river, filled with Chinese figures and stalls, was referred to as "the Square" or "Respondentia Square." The drawing is part of a…
Read the full account in the museum source.
George Chinnery (Chinese: 錢納利; 5 January 1774 – 30 May 1852) was an English painter who spent most of his life in Asia, especially India and southern China.
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