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Langdon Warner (1881–1955) was an American
archaeologist Archaeology or archeology is the scientific study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of artifacts, architecture, biofacts or ecofacts, sites, and cultural landscap ...
and
art historian Art history is the study of aesthetic objects and visual expression in historical and stylistic context. Traditionally, the discipline of art history emphasized painting, drawing, sculpture, architecture, ceramics and decorative arts; yet today ...
specializing in East Asian art. He was a professor at
Harvard Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...
and the Curator of Oriental Art at Harvard’s Fogg Museum. He is reputed to be one of the models for
Steven Spielberg Steven Allan Spielberg (; born December 18, 1946) is an American director, writer, and producer. A major figure of the New Hollywood era and pioneer of the modern blockbuster, he is the most commercially successful director of all time. Spie ...
's
Indiana Jones ''Indiana Jones'' is an American media franchise based on the adventures of Dr. Henry Walton "Indiana" Jones, Jr., a fictional professor of archaeology, that began in 1981 with the film '' Raiders of the Lost Ark''. In 1984, a prequel, '' Th ...
. As an explorer/agent at the turn of the 20th century, he studied the
Silk Road The Silk Road () was a network of Eurasian trade routes active from the second century BCE until the mid-15th century. Spanning over 6,400 kilometers (4,000 miles), it played a central role in facilitating economic, cultural, political, and reli ...
. He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1927.


Career

Warner graduated from Harvard College in 1903 with a specialty in Buddhist art and an interest in archeology. After several field trips to Asia, he returned to Harvard, where he taught the university's first courses in Japanese and Chinese art. The Smithsonian Institution sent him to Asia in 1913, and he spent more than a year there, but World War I interrupted his work. In 1922 the Fogg Museum again sent him to China.


Frescoes at Dunhuang and controversy over the removal of antiquities

Langdon Warner's work in China is the subject of much controversy among art historians. On the one side, there are those who say that he pillaged sites in Asia of their art, in particular, frescos from the Mogao caves at
Dunhuang Dunhuang () is a county-level city in Northwestern Gansu Province, Western China. According to the 2010 Chinese census, the city has a population of 186,027, though 2019 estimates put the city's population at about 191,800. Dunhuang was a major ...
. Peter Hopkirk: ''Foreign Devils on the Silk Road''. Amherst : University of Massachusetts Press, 1984, c1980Sanchita Balachandran: ''Object Lessons: The Politics of Preservation and Museum Building in Western China in the Early Twentieth Century''. International Journal of Cultural Property (2007), 14 : 1-32 Cambridge University Press In 1922, the Fogg Museum sent Warner to China to explore western China. He arrived at the Mogao Caves in Dunhuang in January 1924 and, armed with a special chemical solution for detaching wall-paintings, he removed twenty-six Tang dynasty masterpieces from caves 335, 321, 323 & 320. Warner first applied the chemical solution (strong glue) to the painting on the cave wall. He then placed a cloth against it. The cloth was then pulled away from the fresco and then he applied plaster of Paris on the back of the painting and transferred the painting to the plaster surface. Warner had found evidence that the caves were the object of vandalism by Russian soldiers and reached an agreement with the local people to purchase the frescoes and remove them in order to save them for posterity. Unfortunately, the removal process resulted in some damage to the site itself. Luckily, frescoes he framed with glue but were unable to remove are still on display in the caves today. Only five of the 26 fragments of murals that he removed are in good enough condition to be exhibited now in the Harvard Art Museums, Cambridge, Massachusetts. The views of the Chinese government towards Warner have varied as intensively as the government itself over the last century. In 1931, the National Commission for the Preservation of Antiquities declared that archeological objects could only be taken from the country if there is no one in the country "sufficiently competent or interested in studying or safe-keeping them." Otherwise, the Commission concluded, it is no longer scientific archeology but commercial vandalism." Warner himself viewed his work as a heroic act of preserving art from destruction. He defended taking fragments from the Longmen Grottoes, saying "If we are ever criticized for buying those chips, the love and labor and the dollars we spent on assembling them should silence all criticism. That in itself is a service to the cause of China bigger than anyone else in this country has ever made." It is worth noting, though, that most of the destruction was done to fill orders placed by western collectors using images provide by the buyers. Today the caves in Dunhuang are favored as tourist stops to showcase the Chinese view that the Americans pillaged their heritage. Certain members of the family have requested that the Museum return the pieces to Dunhuang. The Museum's position is that since they have a bill of sale indicating that Warner legitimately purchased the artwork, they have no obligation to return them. The Warner family acknowledges both points of view on the matter and seeks resolution.


World War II

Warner's archaeological career was interrupted by the United States' entry into World War II and he became part of the Monuments, Fine Arts and Archives (MFAA) Section of the U.S. Army. He was brought on as an advisor to the MFAA Section in Japan from April to September 1946. He has been given credit by some for advising against firebombing and the use of the
atomic bomb A nuclear weapon is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either fission (fission bomb) or a combination of fission and fusion reactions (thermonuclear bomb), producing a nuclear explosion. Both bomb ...
on Kyoto, Nara, and
Kamakura is a city in Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan. Kamakura has an estimated population of 172,929 (1 September 2020) and a population density of 4,359 persons per km² over the total area of . Kamakura was designated as a city on 3 November 1939. Kamak ...
and other ancient cities to protect cultural heritage of Japan. There are monuments erected in Kyoto, Hōryū-ji (outside the western edge of
Hōryū-ji temple is a Buddhist temple that was once one of the powerful Seven Great Temples, in Ikaruga, Nara Prefecture, Japan. Its full name is , or Learning Temple of the Flourishing Law, the complex serving as both a seminary and monastery. The temple was ...
), and Kamakura (outside Kamakura JR Station) in his honor for this reason. However,
Otis Cary Otis Cary (October 20, 1921 April 14, 2006) was an American Japanologist. Early life and education Cary was born on October 20, 1921 in Otaru, Hokkaido, Japan. He was the son of American missionaries. He moved to the United States after element ...
has argued that the credit for sparing Japan's cultural heritage sites belongs not to Langdon but to the U.S. Secretary of War, Henry L. Stimson.


Major works

*''The Long Old Road in China'' (1926) *''The Craft of the Japanese Sculptor'' (1936) *''Buddhist Wall-Paintings: A Study of a Ninth-Century Grotto at Wan Fo Hsia'' (1938) *''The Enduring Art of Japan'' (1952) *''Japanese Sculpture of the Tempyo Period: Masterpieces of the Eighth Century'' (1959)


See also

*
Caleb Warner Caleb Warner (September 12, 1922 - August 24, 2017), was a marine and acoustical engineer and a classical trumpeter, who was best known for co-designing the Baldwin Spinet Electric harpsichord which was used on The Beatles' song '' Because''. Biog ...
— his son *
List of Directors of the Philadelphia Museum of Art The Philadelphia Museum of Art (PMoA) is an art museum originally chartered in 1876 for the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia. The main museum building was completed in 1928 on Fairmount, a hill located at the northwest end of the Benjamin Fr ...


Notes


References

* Theodore Robert Bowie, ed., ''Langdon Warner Through His Letters''. Bloomington: Indiana U. P., 1966 * *


External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Warner, Langdon 1881 births 1955 deaths People from Ipswich, Massachusetts American explorers Explorers of East Asia Harvard University faculty American sinologists Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Monuments men Harvard College alumni American art historians Directors of the Philadelphia Museum of Art Historians from Massachusetts