Description
Emperor Qianlong was a great patron of the arts, architecture and literature, not just Chinese but also Manchu, Tibetan and Western. He commissioned European style portraits for the court and ordered the construction of grand European-style additions to the Old Summer Palace in Beijing, sadly destroyed by invading British and French forces during the Second Opium War in 1860. The ruins of his palace are now an important historical site and have become a symbol of China’s ”national wound“ from this period of foreign domination.