tobacco & early modern economy: colonialism, enslavement, cultural histories
projects: gabrielle l’hirondelle hill at moma. “in indigenous economies, tobacco was not simply a trading commodity"
tobacco, originally cultivated in the americas, considered sacred by indigenous peoples across north, central south america. part of spirituality, used in ritual, ceremony, prayer. of all the species of tobacco, 2 types are consumed by humans: nicotiana tabacum, nicotiana rustica (typically, named after a french ambassador to portugal who sent seeds to paris in 1550).
now the domestic crop of countries across the globe, tobacco and its changing relationship to the concept of being ‘foreign’ (and other even more alienating terms) is interesting to think about.
chinese woman posed with water pipe. popular posed image (for export?) recalls japanese photograph, below
'smoking tobacco,' unknown, japanese, 19th century, tinted albumen print
the history of tobacco’s global spread is interesting in relationship to snuff bottles for reasons including:
- the spread of tobacco across china shows china’s interconnection with a global economy in early modern times. while its spread is often credited solely to european trade, golden silk smoke details a more multi-pronged infusion of tobacco into china that includes caravan travel along ancient overland trade routes to central asia, middle east, russia, india
- tobacco is exploited by europeans and others as a tool within colonialism, capitalist power structures and global conquest. tabacco grown using the labour of enslaved africans in colonized spanish/portuguese south american plantations was so commercially viable that english/dutch/french colonizers did the same in their colonies
- tobacco reveals class and social structures within china in the way it’s domesticated and adopted in china. different intake methods included pipe tobacco (carried around the world in the pockets of sailors, enslaved people, merchants), snuff bottles, water pipes (traditions from muslim diaspora. see also, ma shaoxuan), and in republican china, the rolled western cigarette. chen cong, writing at the end of the 18th century: “It originally came from beyond the borders, but in every place it has reached, it has become a ‘local product’”
- tobacco sets the stage for the largescale introduction of british-import opium in china triggering the opium wars, and tying back into snuff bottles directly through the looting of yuanmingyuan
currently, china is the largest current producer and consumer of tobacco in the world. one in 3 cigarettes worldwide is smoked in china, according to WHO
still life with walnuts, tobacco and wine. hubert van ravesteyn, 1671, oil on canvas.
content warning below for close-up which includes a racist caricature:
translation & speculative notes by belgian friend & archivist, timo van havere:
year 1671 / oriental varinas tobacco / at dordrecht (a place in the netherlands) by marschaal (the name of the shopowner?)
'oriental' in context: when referring to goods, 'oriental' used to denote 'excellent' in the 17th century
further context: also at the same time, asian porcelain + curios were an export good to the US and europe, seen as exotica, something ‘externally incomprehensible.’ they were collected as ‘craft’ rather than ‘fine art’ bc westerners dismissed asian art as being produced by copying. notably, images were often distorted or misinterpreted and were also produced by chinese and japanese artists to cater to what asian makers considered to be western taste. it's an ouroboros!