In this book, Susangeline Patrick considers how European and Asian Christian missionaries communicated religious doctrine through the visual arts in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Greater China.
Zooming in on these rich cross-cultural and inter-religious artifacts, Patrick reveals how Christian images and visual culture reflected, interacted with, and influenced spiritual and sociopolitical powers. Across five sections, Patrick looks beyond liturgical art, locating religious visual arts within alternative spheres such as Christian charitable institutions, cartography, and bodily behavior and intentionally sheds light on Christian women's initiatives and participation in art, devotion, and power. In the study of the intersection of art, devotion, and power in early modern China, Patrick underscores the interreligious and global aspects of encounters that shaped and impacted the production, circulation, and outcome of devotional art.
