Art in the Realm

Art in the Realm comes in many forms: painting, calligraphy, theatre, sculpture, music, cuisine, poetry, flower arrangement, and many others are all practiced and praised within the Scarlet Empire.

Folk (Peasant) Art

Most inhabitants of the Isle are peasants limited to folk art, whittling decorative details into their doorframes or traditional songs and dances for celebratory occasions.

Realm (Patrician) Art

Urban citizens and patricians have more access to fine art to decorate their walls and fill their hours, and from this segment of the population come those elements most associated with Realm art by the aristocrats of the Threshold: wall scrolls of beautiful calligraphy presenting poems, anecdotes, and classic quotations free of any illustration, and creative interweaving and patterning of geometric shapes to create beautiful works without violating the aniconic demands of Immaculate teachings.

Dynastic Art

Above the patricians, the art of the Dynasty itself is far different: the Dragonblooded and their family members inhabit a world of luxurious excess, freed of the religious strictures against iconic imagery by their supposedly enlightened station. Even here, though, calligraphy and poetry are viewed as the highest forms of art, and others occupy a second-place status to those exalted arts. This favoritism is in part related to the inherited Shogunate ideal of the warrior-poet, but may also relate to the personal tastes of the Scarlet Empress: both Rawar (the only Imperial Husband) and Tepet (the most favoured of Her Imperial Consorts) were known to be masterful poets.

Full-time Dragonblooded artists are very rare in the Dynasty: amongst the ten thousand Exalted Dynasts, perhaps two dozen devote their lives to art. A Dynast is expected to be able to pick up an instrument and play, to step onto a stage and act, to sit under a cherry tree and compose a verse, not as a professional pursuit but simply as a basic demand of being a Dynast, and the needs of Creation dictate that the main responsibility of an Exalted Dynast must be matters of war and statecraft. Dragonblooded artists suffer the contradiction of being praised for the peerless beauty of their artworks, beyond mortal ken through use of their enlightened Essence, while simultaneously being looked down upon for failing to devote themselves to the pursuits the Dynasty considers of true importance. The job of art, much like filling the middle ranks of bureaucracy and commercial enterprise, falls to the Dynasts whose souls have not achieved Exaltation: such persons have upper-class leisure time to practice naught but art, and protection from Immaculate reprisal through their Blessed relatives, but are viewed as useless for true positions of responsibility in the rule and protection of Creation. Thus, the vast bulk of the art enjoyed by the Dynasty is produced either as a casual side-project by a Dragonblood busy with more important matters, or by their unExalted siblings and cousins.

Shogunate Art

There is a great deal of respect for the art produced during the Shogunate era. Painted screens, produced on now-lost imperishable silks, are prominently displayed in many Dynastic households… almost exclusively martial scenes. The ideal of a warrior-poet mastering both battle and verse has also been passed down from Shogunate visions of a perfect Dragonblooded soldier.

Many Shogunate works, such as the plays The Peach Blossom Fan and Palace of Eternal Life, are viewed as perfection of their craft, modern performers unable to surpass them and left only to prove their skills by perfect replication.

Old Guard vs. New Wave

Dragonblooded Dynasts who involve themselves in art as primary pursuit have incredible influence over the unExalted Dynasts and lower classes who dominate production of art. Elder Dynasts, even if not devoted fully to art themselves, gain significant pull by serving as sponsors to direct artistic production.

Amongst modern Dynastic artists, there has emerged a rift between two camps, who differ greatly in opinion on the proper approach to art.

Old Guard

“To be spectacularly wrong is usually an inspiring sight… such profound errors demand creativity, imagination, to compose. But I have never met a cabal like this, which has managed to perfect the production of wrong opinion without a single imaginative sprout. The old guard of the supposed classics shall, in the end, find themselves left behind as greater talents take the lead. Our new wave of flowers shall bloom so great and so expansive that those sad little weeds will shrivel and rot beneath us for lack of light.” ”
- Cynis Shungado on the Old Guard, RY686.

The Old Guard of Dynastic Art do not refer to themselves as such, the term instead drawn from a tirade against them by renowned artist Cynis Shungado a century ago. Its members do not consider themselves to be a group or association at all: their position is that the classic works and approaches to art, many passed down from the Shogunate, are the only correct approach, any deviation from that a personal failing on the part of the artist, deserving of condemnation. True art, to the Old Guard, is also a thing for the upper classes, because only an Exalted Dynast can truly appreciate the fine elements of art, anything aimed for the lower classes must abandon perfection in favour of crass elements.

Holding the greatest influence and resources, Old Guard artists remain dominant in the upper levels of Realm art. Prominent members include V’neef Mahara, Tepet Chotei, and Tepet Vergus.

New Wave

“The ‘New Wave’? Granting them title gives too much respect, but it is not inaccurate: like the waves of the Wyld lapping at the shores of our Creation, they seek to destroy all that is good in art, to pull down greatness and mar it with their defecations.

They are gripped by the worst forms of selfishness. True art looks to perfection and takes the time to understand it, then hand-in-hand with her fellows the artist ascends to admire its heights. Sharing understanding of perfect art, together we produce works that are truly sublime. The filth who call themselves ‘New Wave’… too inept to understand perfection, they have abandoned community in selfish pursuit of individual glory. They waste the blessing of their Exaltation in pursuing the path forged by the Anathema, and risk leading our lessers astray with their foul example. And, as it is our duty to defend Creation from the Anathema through our Wyld Hunt, so too must we stand ready to defend true art from their heresies, by any means necessary. ”

- V’neef Mahara, on the New Wave.

The New Wave is a self-assigned title for artists who reject the classic-focused approach to art promulgated amongst the Old Guard, instead favouring new methods and unique works never before seen, or adapting classical approaches to reach expanded audiences amongst the common folk. New Wave artists are not organized, nor do they share an ideology: each artist considered part of the New Wave holds differing, and opposing, views to his fellows on the proper approach to art. The only unifying factor is that each is condemned by the Old Guard… when this condemnation is not immediately apparent, New Wave artists will battle each other with as much vehemence as they battle the established conservatives.

Only a few artists are considered part of the New Wave. These include Cynis Shungado, Cynis Bei, Ragara Ikkyu, and V’neef Hamdi.