A Day on the Grand Canal with the Emperor of China

As a part of our programming for the exhibition, David Hockney: Perspective Should Be Reversed: Prints from the Collections of Jordan D. Schnitzer and His Family Foundation, we invite you to join us for several screenings of the film: A Day on the Grand Canal with the Emperor of China (1988). This 45-minute film will be screened on the museum’s 3rd floor, in the Lecture Hall, at three times throughout the day: 11:00 AM, 1:00 PM, 2:00 PM

The film follows artist David Hockney on a captivating journey through China via a magnificent, seventy-two-foot-long seventeenth-century Chinese scroll.

Painted by Wang Hui (1632–1717) and his assistants, the work, known as “The Kangxi Emperor’s Southern Inspection Tour (1691–1698), Scroll Seven,” depicts a continuous travel narrative filled with details of daily life in various towns and the countryside.

Hockney’s charming narration brings the bustling streets and waterfronts of three hundred years ago to life and offers fascinating insight into his own artistic vision. Directed by Philip Haas.