poetic feeling in a thatched pavilion attributed to the chinese y
DESCRIPTION
This text describes poetic feelings in a thatched pavilion felt by some ancient china-man in forms that are both poetic and filled with unbridled enthusiasm. No one can read it and not weep. Karl Marx and Jung alike would shed a tear of perturbations of Chinese human conditions in that remote era. 2015 is now but the hope springs eternalTRANSCRIPT
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University of IowaIowa Research Online
Theses and Dissertations
2013
Poetic feeling in a thatched pavilion attributed tothe Chinese Yuan artist Wu ZhenSicong ZhuUniversity of Iowa
Copyright 2013 Sicong Zhu
This dissertation is available at Iowa Research Online: http://ir.uiowa.edu/etd/4983
Follow this and additional works at: http://ir.uiowa.edu/etd
Part of the History of Art, Architecture, and Archaeology Commons
Recommended CitationZhu, Sicong. "Poetic feeling in a thatched pavilion attributed to the Chinese Yuan artist Wu Zhen." MA (Master of Arts) thesis,University of Iowa, 2013.http://ir.uiowa.edu/etd/4983.
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POETIC FEELING IN A THATCHED PAVILION ATTRIBUTED TO THE
CHINESE YUAN ARTIST WU ZHEN
by
Sicong Zhu
A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment
of the requirements for the
Master of Arts degree in Art History
in the Graduate College of
The University of Iowa
December 2013
Thesis Supervisor: Associate Professor Robert Rorex
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Copyright by
SICONG ZHU
2013
All Rights Reserved
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Graduate College
The University of Iowa
Iowa City, Iowa
CERTIFICATE OF APPROVAL
_________________________
MASTERS THESIS ____________
This is to certify that the Masters thesis of
Sicong Zhu
has been approved by the Examining Committee
for the thesis requirement for the Master of Arts
degree in Art History at
the December 2013 graduation.
Thesis Committee: ___________________________ Robert Rorex, Thesis Supervisor
___________________________ Dorothy Johnson
___________________________ Wallace Tomasini
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To my parents, Lihua Leng and Xiaogang Zhu
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I am especially thankful to Professor Robert Rorex, my advisor and MA thesis
committee chair who offered me a lot of valuable advices not only on my thesis in
particular, but also on the proper and efficient ways to do research on dynastic Chinese
art in general. I am also very thankful to Professor Dorothy Johnson, whose 19-century
art classes and whose suggestions on my papers and thesis offered me significant
inspiration and direction during the two-year process of my art history study in Iowa City,
and to Professor Wallce Tomasini, whose viewpoints on Chinese art from the perspective
of a Renaissance scholar provided me very interesting insights and enlightment, and
whose constant support and encouragement as a senior scholar and graduate advisor of
the Art History Department helped me through many difficult moments in my study.
I also owe a lot of thanks to Professor Joan Stanley-Baker, whose monograph Old
Masters Repainted: Wu Zhen, 1280-1354: Prime Objects and Accretions (Hong Kong:
Hong Kong University Press, 1995) which I encountered in 2011 opened my eyes to the
field of connoisseurship study in Chinese art and initiated my interest to study Wu Zhen
in my MA thesis.
Sincere thanks goes to Professor Qingsheng Zhu, my advisor in college and the one
who brought me into the world of art history with his intellectually stimulating classes
and his gentle and humble personality as an art historian.
I thank my parents who supported me in studying art history and in pursuing my
graduate study in the United States. I thank them so much for their unfailing love and
tolerance all these years, for their understanding and open-mindedness not only as parents,
but as trustworthy friends.
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I also want to thank my husband and my best friend Renyu Zhang, whose constant
love and enduring patience has always been my great comfort, and without whom this
thesis would not have been possible.
Most of all, I thank my Savior and Lord Jesus Christ, who is my hope and
cornerstone, and whose love and faithfulness accompanied me through all my dark times.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
LIST OF FIGURES..... vi
LIST OF GLOSSARY AND CHINESE TEXTS........ xvi
INTRODUCTION. 1
Literature Review.. 2
CHAPTER
I. POETIC FEELING IN A THATCHED PAVILION.. 9
About the Handscroll.. 9 Inscriptions, Calligraphy and Sealing. 12
Visual Analysis... 26
II. POETIC FEELING IN A THATCHED PAVILION IN THE TRADITION OF
GARDEN PAINTING................................................................................... 39
III. CONCLUSION 45
APPENDIX
A. A SHORT BIOGRAPHY OF WU ZHEN. 48
B. DOCUMENTED WU ZHEN STYLE... 51
C. AN INTRODUCTION TO CHINESE LANDSCAPE PAINTINGS. 63
D. ILLUSTRATIONS.. 73
BIBLIOGRAPHY.... 164
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LIST OF FIGURES
Figure D 1 Wu Zhen (ascribed to), Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion, dated
1347. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland. .................................... 73
Figure D 2 Wu Zhen (ascribed to), inscription of Poetic Feeling in a Thatched
Pavilion, dated 1347. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland. ........... 74
Figure D 3 Wu Zhen, Fishermans Idyll, 1342. Palace Museum, Taipei. Inscription. ..... 75
Figure D 4 Wu Zhen, Bamboo and Rock, 1347. Palace Museum, Taipei. Inscription.
................................................................................................................... 76
Figure D 5 Wu Zhen, Twin Junipers, 1328. National Palace Museum, Taipei.
Inscription and signature. .......................................................................... 77
Figure D 6 Wu Zhen, Central Mountain (or Mountain among Mountains), National
Palace Museum, Taipei. Inscription and seal. ........................................... 78
Figure D 7 Zhao Mengfu, Autumn Colours on the Qiao and Hua Mountains, detail
of inscription, 1295. National Palace Museum, Taipei. ............................ 79
Figure D 8 Wang Hui. Snowy Studio in a Mountain Village after Wang Youcheng.
1674-77. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Detail of
inscription. ................................................................................................ 80
Figure D 9 Wu Zhen (ascribed to), the character gou in the inscription of Poetic
Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion, dated 1347. The Cleveland Museum
of Art, Cleveland. ...................................................................................... 80
Figure D 10 Wu Zhen (ascribed to), the character duan in the inscription of
Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion, dated 1347. The Cleveland
Museum of Art, Cleveland. ....................................................................... 81
Figure D 11 Wu Zhen (ascribed to), the character qing (clear) in the inscription
of Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion, dated 1347. The
Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland. ..................................................... 81
Figure D 12 Wu Zhen (ascribed to), the character gong in the inscription of
Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion, dated 1347. The Cleveland
Museum of Art, Cleveland. ....................................................................... 82
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Figure D 13 Wu Zhen (ascribed to), the character qing (emotion) in the
inscription of Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion, dated 1347.
The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland. .............................................. 83
Figure D 14 Wu Zhen (ascribed to), the character he in the inscription of Poetic
Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion, dated 1347. The Cleveland Museum
of Art, Cleveland. ...................................................................................... 83
Figure D 15 Wu Zhen (ascribed to), the character sha in the inscription of Poetic
Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion, dated 1347. The Cleveland Museum
of Art, Cleveland. ...................................................................................... 84
Figure D 16 Wu Zhen (attributed to), 1st leaf of Manual of Bamboo in Monochrome
Ink, dated 1350. Album leaf, ink on paper, 41.3x52 cm. National
Palace Museum, Taipei. ............................................................................ 84
Figure D 17 Wu Zhen (attributed to), leaf 17 jing shen zhu yi (the bamboos in a
deep alley) of Manual of Bamboo in Monochrome Ink, dated 1350.
Album leaf, ink on paper, 41.3x52 cm. National Palace Museum,
Taipei. ....................................................................................................... 85
Figure D 18 Wu Zhen (attributed to), leaf 19 qing feng wu bai gan (500 bamboos in
clear wind) of Manual of Bamboo in Monochrome Ink, dated 1350.
Album leaf, ink on paper, 41.3x52 cm. National Palace Museum,
Taipei. ....................................................................................................... 86
Figure D 19 Wu Zhen (attributed to), characters zhu and fang in leaf 20 xuan
miao guan zhu (the bamboos in the Xuanmiao Temple) of Manual of
Bamboo in Monochrome Ink, dated 1350. Album leaf, ink on paper,
41.3x52 cm. National Palace Museum, Taipei. ........................................ 87
Figure D 20 Wu Zhen (ascribed to), the character zhu and fang in the
inscription of Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion, dated 1347.
The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland. .............................................. 87
Figure D 21 Wu Zhen (attributed to), the characters mei, fang, and wei in
Bamboo and Rock, 1347. National Palace Museum, Taipei. .................... 88
Figure D 22 Wu Zhen (ascribed to), the character mei, fang and wei in the
inscription of Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion, dated 1347.
The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland. .............................................. 88
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Figure D 23 Wu Zhen (attributed to), the characters nian, yue, shu and the
phrase xi zuo in Central Mountain, 1366. National Palace
Museum, Taipei. Detail of artists seals.................................................... 89
Figure D 24 Wu Zhen (ascribed to), the character nian, yue, shu and the
phrase xi zuo in the inscription of Poetic Feeling in a Thatched
Pavilion, dated 1347. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland. ........... 90
Figure D 25 Wu Zhen (ascribed to), inscription (the characters nian and zuo) of
Twin Junipers, dated 1328. Hanging scroll, ink on silk, 180.1 x 11.4
cm. National Palace Museum, Taipei. ...................................................... 91
Figure D 26 Wu Zhen (ascribed to), inscription (the characters nian and zuo) of
Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion, dated 1347. The Cleveland
Museum of Art, Cleveland. Detail of artists seals. .................................. 92
Figure D 27 Wu Zhen (attributed to), inscription of Fisherman Recluse on Lake
Dongting, dated 1341. Hanging scroll, ink on paper, 146.4x58.6 cm.
National Palace Museum, Taipei. ............................................................. 93
Figure D 28 Wu Zhen, detail of inscription (the phrases Zhizheng, xi zuo and
the character mei) of Fishermans Idyll, 1342. Hanging scroll, ink
on silk, 176.1x95.6 cm. National Palace Museum, Taipei. ...................... 94
Figure D 29 Wu Zhen (ascribed to), Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion, dated
1347. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland. Detail of artists
seals. .......................................................................................................... 95
Figure D 30 Wu Zhen (attributed to), Central Mountain, 1366. National Palace
Museum, Taipei. Detail of artists seals.................................................... 96
Figure D 31 Wu Zhen (attributed to), Bamboo and Rock, 1347. National Palace
Museum, Taipei. Detail of artists seals.................................................... 97
Figure D 32 Wang Meng (1308-1385), detail of Bamboo Cottage by Lake
Tai/Retreat at Ju-qu, not dated. 68.7x42.5 cm, ink and color on
paper. National Palace Museum, Taipei. .................................................. 98
Figure D 33 Zhao Mengfu, The Mind Landscape of Xie Youyu, ca. 1287.
Handscroll, ink and colors on silk, 27.4 x 117.0 cm. Princeton Art
Museum, Princeton. .................................................................................. 98
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Figure D 34 Ni Zan, detail of Panoramic View of the Lion Grove Garden, 1373.
Handscroll. Repository unknown.............................................................. 99
Figure D 35 Wen Zhengming, detail of East Garden, 1530. Handscroll, ink and
color on silk, 30.2 x 126.4cm. Palace Museum, Beijing. ....................... 100
Figure D 36 Xu Ben, the Lion Grove Garden (shi zi lin). Album leaf, ink on paper,
22.5 x 27.1 cm. National Palace Museum, Taipei. ................................. 101
Figure D 37 Wen Zhengming, Garden of the Inept Administrator (Zhuozheng Yuan
tu shi), leaf D, 1551. Album leaf, ink on paper, 26.4 x 27.3 cm. The
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. .............................................. 102
Figure D 38 Qian Gu, The Small and Tranquil Garden (xiao zhi yuan). Album leaf,
ink and color on paper, 28.5 x 39.1 cm, from the album Travel
Sketches (Ji xing tu ce). National Palace Museum, Taipei. .................... 103
Figure D 39 Wu Zhen, detail of fisherman in Fisherman (Lutan diaoting), ca. 1350.
Handscroll, ink on paper, 24.8 x 43.2 cm. The Metropolitan
Museum of Art, New York. .................................................................... 104
Figure D 40 Zhao Mengfu (1254-1322), detail of Autumn Color on the Qiao and
Hua Mountains, not dated. Handscroll, ink and color on paper, 24.8
x 93.2 cm. National Palace Museum, Taipei. ......................................... 105
Figure D 41 Zhao Mengfu, detail of River Village: Fishermans Joy, 1279-1322.
Fan painting mounted as album leaf, ink and color on silk, 28.6cm x
30cm. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland. ................................. 106
Figure D 42 Wu Zhen (ascribed to), Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion, dated
1347. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland. Detail of pavilion. .... 107
Figure D 43 Wu Zhen, Fishermans Idyll, 1342. National Palace Museum, Taipei.
Detail of thatched gate. ........................................................................... 107
Figure D 44 Wu Zhen (attributed to), Fisherman after Jing Hao, dated 1342. Freer
Gallery of Art, Washington D.C. Detail of pavilion. .............................. 108
Figure D 45 Wu Zhen (attributed to), Fishermen (Liu Zongyuan Zhuan Yufutujuan),
Shanghai Museum of Art, Shanghai. Detail of pavilion. ........................ 109
Figure D 46 Ni Zan, detail of pavilion in Rongxi Studio, 1372. Hanging scroll, ink
on paper, 74.7 x 35.5 cm. National Palace Museum, Taipei. ................. 110
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Figure D 47 Ni Zan, Rongxi Studio, 1372. Hanging scroll, ink on paper, 74.7 x 35.5
cm, National Palace Museum, Taipei. .................................................... 111
Figure D 48 Chu Te-juns Playing the Chin beneath Pines. National Palace
Museum, Taipei. ..................................................................................... 112
Figure D 49 Xiang Yuanbian (attributed), River Landscape, dated 1578.
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. .............................................. 113
Figure D 50 Tang Yin, The Thatched Hut of Dreaming of an Immortal, early 16th
century. The Freer Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. ............................ 113
Figure D 51 Wu Zhen (ascribed to), Twin Junipers, dated 1328. Hanging scroll, ink
on silk, 180.1 x 11.4 cm. National Palace Museum, Taipei. .................. 114
Figure D 52 Wu Zhen (1280-1354, attributed to), left part of Mountain among
Mountains, dated 1336. Handscroll, ink on paper, 26.4 x 90.7 cm.
National Palace Museum, Taipei. ........................................................... 115
Figure D 53 Wu Zhen, Fishermans Idyll, 1342. Hanging scroll, ink on silk.
National Palace Museum, Taipei. ........................................................... 116
Figure D 54 Wu Zhen (attributed to), Fisherman (Lutan Diaoting), ca. 1350.
Handscroll, ink on paper, 24.8 x 43.2 cm. The Metropolitan
Museum of Art, New York. .................................................................... 117
Figure D 55 Wu Zhen (attributed to), Spring Dawn on a Clear River, undated.
National Palace Museum of Art, Taipei. ................................................ 118
Figure D 56 Wu Zhen (attributed to), Painting of Latter Ode on the Red Cliff,
undated. National Palace Museum, Taipei. ............................................ 119
Figure D 57 Wu Zhen (attributed to), Fishermen (Liu Zongyuan Zhuan Yufutujuan),
Shanghai Museum of Art, Shanghai. ...................................................... 120
Figure D 58 Wu Zhen (attributed to), Fishermen after Jing Hao (section 1 and 2),
ca. 1342. Handscroll, ink on paper, 32.5 x 565.6 cm. The Freer
Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. ........................................................... 121
Figure D 59 Wu Zhen (attributed to), Fishermen after Jing Hao (section 3 and 4),
ca. 1342. Handscroll, ink on paper, 32.5 x 565.6 cm. The Freer
Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. ........................................................... 122
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Figure D 60 Wu Zhen (attributed to), Fishermen after Jing Hao (section 5 and 6),
ca. 1342. Handscroll, ink on paper, 32.5 x 565.6 cm. The Freer
Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. ........................................................... 123
Figure D 61 Wu Zhen, detail of Bamboo and Rock, 1347. Hanging scroll, ink on
paper, 90.6 x 42.5 cm. National Palace Museum, Taipei. ...................... 124
Figure D 62 Wu Zhen (ascribed to), detail of Twin Junipers, dated 1328. Hanging
scroll, ink on silk, 180.1 x 11.4 cm. National Palace Museum, Taipei.
................................................................................................................. 125
Figure D 63 Wu Zhen (1280-1354, ascribed to), detail of Mountain among
Mountains, not dated. Handscroll, ink on paper, 26.4 x 90.7 cm.
National Palace Museum, Taipei. ........................................................... 126
Figure D 64 Wu Zhen (1280-1354, ascribed to), detail of Autumn Mountains.
Hanging scroll, ink on silk, 150.9 x 103.8 cm. National Palace
Museum, Taipei. ..................................................................................... 127
Figure D 65 Wu Zhen (ascribed to), detail of Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion,
dated 1347. Hanging scroll, ink on paper, 23.8cm x 99.4cm. The
Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland. ................................................... 128
Figure D 66 Wu Zhen (1280-1354), detail of Spring Dawn on a Clear River,
Hanging scroll, ink and light color on silk, 114.7x100.6 cm.
National Palace Museum, Taipei. ........................................................... 128
Figure D 67 Wu Zhen (1280-1354), detail of Hermit Fisherman on an Autumn
River, not dated. Hanging scroll, ink on silk, 189.1x88.5 cm.
National Palace Museum, Taipei. ........................................................... 129
Figure D 68 Li Gonglin, detail of Gathering at the West Garden, 1080. Handscroll,
ink on paper, 26.5 406cm. Unknown repository. ................................ 130
Figure D 69 Wang Fu, one section of the Study by Lake Tai at the Foot of a Hill
(hu shan shu wu), 1410. Handscroll, ink on paper, 27.5 x 820.5 cm.
Liaoning Provincial Museum, Shenyang. ............................................... 130
Figure D 70 Du Qiong (1396-1474), one section of Befriending the Pines (you song
tu). Handscroll, ink and color on paper, 28.8 x 92.5cm. Palace
Museum, Beijing. .................................................................................... 131
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Figure D 71 Qiu Ying (ca. 1494-1552), Orchid Pavilion. Fan painting, blue and
green on gold dusted paper, 21.5 x 31.2cm. Palace Museum, Beijing.
................................................................................................................. 131
Figure D 72 Qiu Ying, detail of Garden for Self-Enjoyment, 1515-1552. Handscroll,
ink and slight color on silk, 27.8 x 381 cm. Cleveland Museum of
Art, Cleveland. ........................................................................................ 132
Figure D 73 Wen Zhengming, detail of Tea Party at Mount. Hui, 1518. Handscroll,
ink and color on paper, 21.9 x 67cm. Palace Museum, Beijing. ............ 133
Figure D 74 Wen Zhengming, detail of Purification Ritual at the Orchid Pavilion,
1542. Handscroll, ink and color on gold dusted paper, 24.2 x 60.1cm.
Palace Museum, Beijing. ........................................................................ 134
Figure D 75 Obstructive scene made through the Taihu rock, Gate of Benevolence
and Longevity (Renshou men), Summer Palace, Beijing. ...................... 135
Figure D 76 Qu Ding (attributed to, active ca. 1023-1056), detail of Summer
Mountains. Handscroll, ink and light color on silk, 44.1 x 116.8 cm.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. ....................................... 136
Figure D 77 Zhang Zeduan, detail of Spring Festival on the River (Qingming shang
he tu), early 12th
century. Handscroll, in and color on silk, 25.5 x
525 cm. Palace Museum, Beijing. .......................................................... 136
Figure D 78 Qian Xuan, detail of Wang Xizhi Watching Geese, ca. 1295.
Handscroll, ink, color and gold on paper, 23.2 x 92.7 cm. The
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. .............................................. 137
Figure D 79 Xia Yuan, detail of The Yellow Pavilion, ca. 1350. Album leaf, ink on
silk, 20.6 x 26.7 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. ..... 138
Figure D 80 Leng Mei, the Mountain Resort in Chengde (bi shu shan zhuang tu),
1713. Hanging scroll, ink and color on silk, 254.8 x 172.5cm. Palace
Museum, Beijing. .................................................................................... 139
Figure D 81 Wang Yun, one section of Xiu Garden, 1715-1720. Handscroll, ink
and color on silk, 54 x 1294.9 cm.The Lvshun Museum, Dalian,
China. ...................................................................................................... 140
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Figure D 82 Anonymous, right half of View of a Garden Villa, after Yuan Jiang
(active ca.1680-ca.1730), 18th
century. Handscroll, ink and color on
silk, 52.1 x 295 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. ...... 140
Figure D 83 Tang Yifen, detail of Love Garden (Aiyuan tu), 1848. Handscroll, ink
and color on paper, 59 x 160 cm. The British Museum, London. .......... 141
Figure D 84 Shen Zhou (1427-1509), one leaf of East Village. Album leaf, ink and
color on paper, 28.6 x 33 cm. Nanjing Museum, Nanjing. ..................... 142
Figure D 85 Wen Zhengming, one leaf of Garden of the Inept Administrator
depicting the Small Flying Rainbow Bridge (xiao fei hong), dated
1551. Album leaf, ink on paper, 26.6 x 27.3 cm. .................................... 143
Figure D 86 Sun Kehong, detail of Stone Table Garden, dated 1572. Handscroll,
ink and color on paper, 12 3/4 x 272 1/2 inches. Asian Art Museum
of San Francisco, San Francisco. ............................................................ 144
Figure D 87 Sun Kehong, detail of Stone Table Garden, dated 1572. Handscroll,
ink and color on paper, 12 3/4 x 272 1/2 inches. Asian Art Museum
of San Francisco, San Francisco. ............................................................ 145
Figure D 88 Zhang Fu (1546-ca. 1631), one leaf from West Grove. Album leaf, ink
and color on paper, 35 x 25 cm. Wuxi Museum, Wuxi, China. ............. 146
Figure D 89 Zhang Hong, Painting of Zhi Garden, 1627. Album leaf, ink and color
on paper, 32.39 x 34.29 cm. Los Angeles County Museum of Art,
Los Angeles. ........................................................................................... 147
Figure D 90 Zhang Hong, Painting of Zhi Garden, 1627. Album leaf, ink and color
on paper, 32.4 x 34.6 cm. Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los
Angeles. .................................................................................................. 148
Figure D 91 Zhang Hong, Painting of Zhi Garden, 1627. Album leaf, ink and color
on paper, overall including mount: 38.7 x 43.8 cm. Los Angeles
County Museum of Art, Los Angeles. .................................................... 149
Figure D 92 Li Gonglin, one section of Gathering at the West Garden, 1080.
Handscroll, ink on paper, 26.5 406cm. Unknown repository. ............. 150
Figure D 93 Li Gonglin, detail of Gathering at the West Garden, 1080. Handscroll,
ink on paper, 26.5 406cm. Unknown repository. ................................ 151
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Figure D 94 Wu Zhen (ascribed to), detail of Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion,
dated 1347. Hanging scroll, ink on paper, 23.8cm x 99.4cm. The
Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland. ................................................... 152
Figure D 95 Guo Xi (1001-1090), Early Spring, not dated. 158.3 x 108.1 cm, ink
and color on silk. National Palace Museum, Taipei. .............................. 153
Figure D 96 Wang Meng (1308-1385), Bamboo Cottage by Lake Tai/Retreat at Ju-
qu, not dated. 68.7x42.5 cm, ink and color on paper. National Palace
Museum, Taipei. ..................................................................................... 154
Figure D 97 Wang Meng (1308-1385), The Simple Retreat, not dated. 136 x 45 cm,
ink and color on paper. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New
York. ....................................................................................................... 155
Figure D 98 Guo Xi (1001-1090), Old Trees, Level Distance (Left section), not
dated. 35.6 x 104.4 cm, ink and color on silk. The Metropolitan
Museum of Art, New York. .................................................................... 156
Figure D 99 Zhao Mengfu (1254-1322), Twin Pines, Level Distance, ca.1300. 26.8
x 107.5 cm, ink on paper. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New
York. ....................................................................................................... 156
Figure D 100 Xia Gui, Sailboat in Rainstorm, about 1189-94. Ink and light color on
silk, 23.9 x 25.1 cm. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. .............................. 157
Figure D 101 Ni Zan, Woods and Valleys of Mount Y, dated 1372, upper section.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. ....................................... 158
Figure D 102 Zhao Mengfu, left section of Autumn Colors on the Qiao and Hua
Mountains, 1295. Handscroll, ink and color on paper, 24.8 x 93.2
cm. National Palace Museum, Taipei. .................................................... 159
Figure D 103 Dong Yuan (attributed to, d. 962), Wintry Trees by a Lake, not dated.
Hanging scroll, ink and color on silk, 178 x 115.4 cm. Kurokawa
Institute of Ancient Cultures, Nishinomiya, Japan. ................................ 160
Figure D 104 Xia Gui (active ca. 1195-1230), Mountain Market, Clear with Rising
Mist, 13th
century. Album leaf, ink on silk, 24.8 x 21.3 cm. The
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. .............................................. 161
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Figure D 105 Ma Yuan (active ca. 1190-1225), Scholar Viewing a Waterfall, late
12th
century, early 13th
century. Album leaf, ink and color on silk,
25.1 x 26 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. ................ 162
Figure D 106 Yujian, Mountain Market, Clear with Rising Mist, late Southern Song
and early Yuan dynasty. Handscroll, ink on paper, 33.182.8cm.
Idemitsu Museum of Arts, Tokyo. .......................................................... 163
Figure D 107 Muqi (late 13th
century), Wild Geese on a Sandbank, late Southern
Song and early Yuan dynasty. Handscroll, ink on paper,
33.0109.5cm. Idemitsu Museum of Arts, Tokyo. ................................ 163
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LIST OF GLOSSARY AND CHINESE TEXTS
A
B
C
D
E
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F
G
H ()
I
""
J
K
L
,
M
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N
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1
INTRODUCTION
In the following thesis, I intend to explore the textual, calligraphic and visual nature
of the handscroll Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion dated 1347 and ascribed to the
Chinese artist Wu Zhen (1280-1354), an important Chinese landscapist and bamboo
painter1 who lived in the Yuan dynasty, who was admired by later generations of
Chinese literati painters and connoisseurs as one of the four great masters of the Yuan
dynasty (together with Huang Gongwang, Ni Zan and Wang Meng), and who was the
relatively least intensively studied one among the four masters of Yuan2. A comparison
of Poetic Feeling in the Thatched Pavilion with other garden paintings will offer more
context for understanding the handscroll and its theme: literati gathering in a private
garden.
Although bearing the signature and seals associated with the name of an artist so
highly esteemed in later generations, the work (painting with colophon mounted as a
handscroll) has received relatively slight scholarly attention in recent times. The
following pages present my efforts to bring together what can be known about the scroll
from historical sources and the critical literature. In addition, the historical, cultural, and
artistic evidence presented by the scroll itself is described and analyzed. The question of
what place the work may occupy in the known body of work, and therefore the career, of
the artist Wu Zhen in the history of Chinese painting is also explored. The fundamental
1 The summation is borrowed from James Cahills PhD dissertation. See Cahill, James. Wu Chen, a Chinese Landscapist and Bamboo Painter of the Fourteenth Century. PhD diss., University of Michigan, 1958.
2 For example, Wus name did not appear in the 17th century connoisseur Chang Ch'ous painting and
calligraphy catalogue Ch'ing ho shu-hua fang , while the other three masters (Huang Gongwang, Ni Zan
and Wang Meng) all found their place in it.
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2
questions raised by scholarly inquiry and those appropriate to connoisseurship are thus
addressed, with evidence brought forth which may serve as a foundation for further
inquiry in the future.
Literature Review
Studies on Wu Zhen published in the 20th
century include (in chronological order
within each category):
1) Researches on individual works or aspects of the Wu Zhen oeuvre: Wu Hufans
Wu Zhonggui yu fu tu juan [Wu Zhens Fisherman Handscroll] (Shanghai: Commercial
Press, 1936), William Lews The fisherman in Yuan painting and literature as reflected
Wu Chen's Yu-Fu T'u in the Shanghai Museum (PhD diss., Ohio University, 1976), Wu
Hufans Wu Zhen Yu fu tu [Wu Zhens Fisherman Handscroll] (Taipei: Taiwan
Commercial Press, 1977), Jiang Zhaoshens tei gyoin [The handscroll Hermit
fisherman on Lake Tung-ting (T y Nigensha, 1980), Sungmii Lee Hans Wu Chen's
"Mo-chu pu" Literati Painter's Manual on In Bamboo (PhD diss., Princeton
University, 1983);
2) General and artistic biographies: Zheng Bingshans Wu Zhen (Shanghai:
Shanghai Peoples Fine Arts Publishing House, 1958), National Palace Museums The
Great Four Masters of the Yuan: Huang Gongwang, Wu Zhen, Ni Zan, Wang Meng
(Taibei: National Palace Museum, 1975), Hironobu Koharas b , ei an, ,
Go Shin [Huang Gongwang, Ni Zan, Wang Meng, Wu Zhen] (T y Ch K ronsha,
1979), Chen Qingguangs Yuan dai hua jia Wu Zhen [Wu Zhen the Yuan dynasty Painter]
(Taipei: National Palace Museum, 1983), Du Zhesen and Song Xiaoxias Wu Zhen
(Shanghai: Shanghai Painting and Calligraphy Press, 1999), Shou Qinzes Dan qing
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3
sheng shou: Huang Gongwang, Wang Meng, Wu Zhen zhuan [Biographies of Huang
Gongwang, Wang Meng and Wu Zhen] (Hangzhou Zhejiang Peoples Publishing House,
2007), Yuan Jianxias Wu Zhen, Ni Zan (Zhengzhou Henan Peoples Fine Arts
Publishing House, 2011).
3) Anthologies of (attributed) Wu Zhen writings (poems, essays, inscriptions and
painting manuals): Ge Yuanxus Mei dao ren yi mo [Wu Zhens Posthumous Writings
(Shanghai: Ge shi xiao yuan, 1876), Wen Huzhou zhu pai [Tong Wens Bamboo Painting
School] (Shanghai: Shang wu yin shu guan, 1939), Meihuadaoren yi mo [Wu Zhens
Posthumous Writings] (Taibei: Taiwan xue sheng shu ju, 1970), Zhuang Shens Yuan ji si
hua jia shi jiao ji [Poetry of the Four Landscape Masters of the late Yuan Period] (Hong
Kong: Centre of Asian Studies, University of Hong Kong, 1973), Ying yin Wu Zhen zhu
pu [Photocopied Wu Zhens Bamboo Manual] (Taibei: Gu gong bo wu yuan, 1976),
Yuan Wu Zhen Xin jing (Beijing: Cultural Relics Publishing House, 1977), Xu Bens
(1335-1393) Mei hua dao ren yi mo /bei guo ji [Ben Xus Collection of Wu Zhens
Posthumous Writings] (Taibei: Student Book, 1985), Zhao Yue and Duan Pings Wu
Zhen shi ci xuan zhu [Selected Annotations of Wu Zhen Poems] (Lanzhou: Gansu
Peoples Publishing House, 1992), Shanghai Boo store Publishing Houses Meidaoren yi
mo: 1 juan [Wu Zhens Posthumous Writings 1st Volumn] (Shanghai: Shanghai
Bookstore Publishing House, 1994);
4) Connoisseurship studies: Joan Stanley-Ba ers Old Masters Repainted: Wu Zhen,
1280-1354: Prime Objects and Accretions (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press,
1995).
Besides these studies on Wu Zhen, a number of catalogues are also dedicated to (or
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4
include) Wu Zhens (attributed) wor s Lao Tianbis (edited) Yuan Wu Zhen shan shui
zhen ji [Authentic Landscapes of Wu Zhen of Yuan Dynasty] (Hong Kong: Xiao Su,
1963), Wai-kam Ho, William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum
of Fine Arts, Cleveland Museum of Art et al, Eight Dynasties of Chinese Painting: the
Collections of the Nelson Gallery-Atkins Museum, Kansas City, and the Cleveland
Museum of Art (Cleveland, Ohio: Cleveland Museum of Art in cooperation with Indiana
University Press; Bloomington, Ind.: Distributed by Indiana University Press, 1980), Wu
Zhonggui mo zhu pu, Li Fangying mo lan ce, Jin Dongxin mo mei ce he ce [Combined
Leaves of Wu Zhens In Bamboo, Li Fangyings In Orchid, Jin Dongxins In Plums]
(Chengdu: Chengdu Ancient Books Publishing House, 1989), Yuan si jia hua ji: Huang
Gongwang Wu Zhen Ni Zan Wang Meng [Four Great Masters of the Yuan: Huang
Gongwang, Wu Zhen, Ni Zan, Wang Meng] (Tianjin Peoples Fine Arts Press, 1994), Mo
zhu pu tu [Leaves of Ink Bamboo Paintings] (Tianjin Tianjin Peoples Publishing House,
2007).
Among all these, monographs on Wu Zhens single or multiple wor s include:
James Cahills 1958 dissertation at the University of Michigan Wu Chen, a Chinese
Landscapist and Bamboo Painter of the Fourteenth Century, William Lews 1976
dissertation at Ohio University The fisherman in Yuan painting and literature as
reflected Wu Chen's Yu-Fu T'u in the Shanghai Museum, Sungmii Lee Hans 1983
dissertation at Princeton University Wu Chen's "Mo-chu pu" Literati Painter's Manual
on In Bamboo, and Joan Stanley-Ba ers 1995 boo Old Masters Repainted: Wu Zhen,
1280-1354: Prime Objects and Accretions (Hong Kong University Press).
In James Cahills dissertation, he pictured Wu Zhens biographical and artistic
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5
career in general and outlined Wu Zhens landscape and bamboos paintings as his
specialty in particular. In William Lews dissertation, he particularly focused on the Yu-
F T (attributed to Wu Zhen) as a reflection of the Yuan poetic and artistic ideal about
fisherman, a long-standing beloved topic of Chinese literati literature and paintings. In
Sungmii Lee Hans dissertation, she paid special attention to the images in Wu Zhens
(attributed to) ink bamboo manual. In Joan Stanley-Ba ers boo , she analyzed in detail
sixteen attributed Wu Zhen works (including landscapes and bamboo paintings) while
referring to the fifty-odd current attributions of Wu Zhen, and determined that only four
of these are from the hand of Wu Zhen (prime objects).
Among all these above-mentioned monographs on Wu Zhen, none of them
mentioned the handscroll Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion. It is understandable
since each of the three dissertations has a particular thematic focus. As for Stanley-
Ba ers boo , she did not make a connoisseurial evaluation regarding Poetic Feeling in a
Thatched Pavilion since the number of ascribed Wu Zhen paintings is so great (The
National Palace Museum, Taipei, where most of Joan Stanley-Ba ers researches too
place, alone houses more than 70 pieces of paintings ascribed to Wu Zhen) that not every
work can be taken a close look at individually in terms of connoisseurship study.
The handscroll Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion has been recorded by several
Chinese connoisseurs and scholars since 1616. In Zhang Chous Qing he shu hua biao
(n.d.), the list of paintings and calligraphy works in the family collection of Zhang Chou,
the handscroll was recorded as part of his collection of Yuan works3; in Wang Luoyus
Shan hu wang (preface 1643), the handscrolls name, author as well as the first two
3 Zhang Chou (1577-1643), Qing he shu hua fang: wai si zhong (Shanghai: Shanghai gu ji chu ban she: Xin
hua shu dian Shanghai fa xing suo fa xing, 1991), 611.
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6
inscriptions (from Wu Zhen and Shen Zhou respectively) are recorded4; in Pei wen zhai
shu hua pu (1702, commissioned by the Kangxi emperor of the Qing dynasty), the
handscroll was recorded as hua ting shi yi, a handscroll on paper made by Taoist Plum
Blossom5.
Since the 19th
century, the handscroll also appeared in another eleven anthologies or
scholarly articles. In J. C. Fergusons Li dai zhu lu hua mu [recorded paintings in Chinese
history] (1934), the author presents the handscrolls recording history in various books
and the exact place where the handscroll appeared in each compilation (in Yu Fengqins
Yu Fengqing Shu hua ti ba ji, in Zhang Chous Qing he shu hua fang, in Wang Luoyus
Shan hu wang, in Zhang Chous Qing he shu hua biao, in the Kangxi emperor-
commissioned Pei wen zhai shu hua pu, in Bian Yongyus Shi gu tang shu hua hui kao,
in Zhang Chous Zhen ji mu lu chu ji); in Zhu Xingzhais Zhong guo shu hua [Chinese
painting and calligraphy], the handscroll was chosen together with 37 other paintings and
calligraphy pieces from Tang to Qing dynasties all of which have undergone personal
examination of the editor (Zhu Xingzhai) at one time or other6 in order to present
selected works in Chinese paintings and calligraphy to art lovers of the world for their
study and appreciation7; in Sherman E. Lees Literati and Professionals Four Ming
Painters (1966), Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion was used to illustrate the single-
4 Wang, Luoyu (b. 1587), Shan hu wang (Taipei: Taiwan shang wu yin shu guan, 1968, volume 2, chapter
9), 919.
5 Sun Yueban, Pei wen zhai shu hua pu: 100 juan (Shanghai: Tong wen shu ju, 1883, volume 16, chapter
100), 6. 6 Zhu Xingzhai, Zhong guo shu hua [Chinese Painting and Calligraphy] (Hong Kong: Chinese Painting and
Calligraphy Press, 1961), index page.
7 Zhu Xingzhai, Zhong guo shu hua [Chinese Painting and Calligraphy] (Hong Kong: Chinese Painting and
Calligraphy Press, 1961), index page. The handscroll appeared on page 21.
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7
stroke, brusque shorthand8 of Wu Zhen, from whom Wen Zhengming learned a lot; in
Handbook, the Cleveland Museum of Art, 1978 (1978), the handscroll appeared in the
section on Chinese Art; in Fu Shens Traces of the Brush: Studies in Chinese
Calligraphy, the handscrolls inscription was used to demonstrate Wu Zhens cursive
script which is a painters calligraphy that lac s the professionals expertise9; in
Chinese Painting: An Escape from the sty World (1981), Marjorie L. Williams
deployed Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion to illustrate Wu Zhens (as well as the
Chinese literatis) wish to live as a recluse away from the dusty world10; in William S.
Talbots Visions of Landscape East and West. (1983), Poetic Feeling in a Thatched
Pavilion acts as an example of the Chinese landscape whose natural detailing was not as
intense as the west11; in Masterpieces from East and West /The Cleveland Museum of
Art (1992), the handscroll appeared in the section on the east as a representative of
scholar-artists pursuit of conceptual visions through calligraphic line12; in Shouqian
Shis Cong Feng ge Dao Hua Yi: Fan si Zhongguo Mei shu Shi [from style to the idea of
painting: a reflection on Chinese art history] (2010), the author used the handscroll as
part of the Wu Zhen oeuvre to illustrate the hermit painters quiet life and his literati
8 Sherman E. Lee, Literati and Professionals Four Ming Painters, The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum
of Art 53, no. 1 (1966): 4.
9 Shen Fu, Marilyn W. Fu, Mary G. Neill, and Mary Jane Clark, Traces of the Brush: Studies in Chinese
Calligraphy (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1980), 87, 104.
10 Marjorie L. Williams, Chinese Painting: An Escape from the sty World (Cleveland, Ohio:
Cleveland Museum of Art; Bloomington, Ind.: Distributed by Indiana University Press, 1981), 53-56.
11 William S. Talbot, Visions of Landscape East and West, The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art
70, no. 3 (1983): 119.
12 Evan H. Turner and John Russell, Masterpieces from East and West/ The Cleveland Museum of Art (New
York, NY: Rizzoli International, 1992), 49.
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8
painting style.13
14
13
Shouqian Shi, Cong feng ge dao hua yi: fan si Zhongguo mei shu shi [from style to the idea of painting: a
reflection on Chinese art history] (Taibei Shi: Shi tou chu ban, 2010), 192-193.
14 For the list of literature history see Wai-kam Ho, William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary
Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, Cleveland Museum of Art et al, Eight Dynasties of Chinese Painting: the
Collections of the Nelson Gallery-Atkins Museum, Kansas City, and the Cleveland Museum of Art
(Cleveland, Ohio: Cleveland Museum of Art in cooperation with Indiana University Press; Bloomington,
Ind.: Distributed by Indiana University Press, 1980), 134.
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9
CHAPTER I POETIC FEELING IN A THATCHED PAVILION
About the Handscroll
Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion (Figure 1), currently in the collection of the
Cleveland Museum of Art, is a handscroll attributed to the Yuan Dynasty landscape and
bamboo painter Wu Zhen, and a work that has received relatively little attention among
the attributed Wu Zhen oeuvre by modern scholarship15
. Based on my interest in Wu
Zhen and the current status of research on Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion, I chose
this handscroll as my MA thesis topic.
Regarding the provenance of Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion, it was owned
successively by the Lees in Hong Kong and the Hos of Macau before it was brought by
someone in London to the United States16
, and was purchased by the Cleveland Museum
of Arts Leonard C. Hanna, Jr. Fund in 1963 from Chiang Er-shih (1913-1972), painter-
collector and art dealer who came to the United States from China in the early 1960s17
,
and has been ept in the Museums collection ever since. In terms of formal and
historical studies, it has served as visual evidence (but not the object in question) of
15
Two major works devoted to Wu Zhens works are James Cahills 1958 dissertation at the University of Michigan, Wu Chen, a Chinese Landscapist and Bamboo Painter of the Fourteenth Century and Joan Stanley-Bakers 1995 book Old Masters Repainted: Wu Zhen, 1280-1354: Prime Objects and Accretions (Hong Kong University Press). However, both these studies did not mention Poetic Feeling in a Thatched
Pavilion.
16 For provenance history see Zhuang Shens Yuan ji si hua jia shi jiao ji [Poetry of the Four Landscape
Masters of the late Yuan Period] (Hong Kong: Centre of Asian Studies, University of Hong Kong, 1973),
69.
17 James Cahill, Chiang Er-shih (From 7/18/07 letter to Hong Zaixin), July 18, 2007, Running Down Blog
(blog), http://jamescahill.info/the-writings-of-james-cahill/responses-a-reminiscences/163-41-chiang-er-
shih. Accessed July 5, 2013.
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10
several pieces of scholarship18
; in respect of connoisseurial inspection, this work has not
yet received specific attention from the academic world.
The handscroll is made of paper, with monochrome ink images. The height and
width of the handscroll are 23.80 cm (9 5/16 inches) and 99.40 cm (39 1/8 inches)
respectively (width including frontispiece, 1 inscription, 3 colophons and 35 seals19
).
According to the inscription, the handscroll painting was composed in the seventh
year of Zhi-zheng (the third era name/reign title of Toghun Temr, Emperor Huizong,
11th
emperor of Yuan dynasty, who ruled from 1333 to 1370), namely 1347.
In terms of the visual character of the painting, it agrees with the undecorative,
unrealistic, and often ambiguous in expression and ambivalent in feeling20 nature of
Yuan literati paintings. The representational aspect is largely diminished, and the playful
character of the literatis in play is revealed. Though the handscroll may loo clumsy or
amateurish upon first sight due to the seemingly less virtuoso brushwork displayed, it is
consistent with many other attributed Wu Zhen paintings and the Yuan literati painting
style. The size being small (23.8 x 99.4 cm) and the format intimate (a handscroll), the
painting presents itself more as a follower of the private garden painting tradition and
carries on the legacy of the Confucian scholars retreat from worldly concerns instead of
as representative of the Northern Song monumental landscape tradition. The thatched
pavilion is not only a building in the painting, but also a recurring motif in the history of
Chinese literati painting which acts as a haven for the literatis hermit life in the woods,
18
See for example, T.C. Wang, Wu Zhen's Poetic Inscriptions on Paintings, in Bulletin of The School of Oriental and African Studies-University of London 64, no. 2 (2001): 208-239.
19 The inscription has been translated by Wai-kam Ho, who also identified the 3 colophons and 27 seals (6
seals still remain to be identified) on the handscroll. See http://www.clevelandart.org/art/1963.259.
20 Wen C. Fong, Beyond Representation: Chinese Painting and Calligraphy, 8th-14th Century (New York:
Metropolitan Museum of Art; New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992), 431.
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11
by the side of a hill or a lake and allows the literati to enjoy the company of nature,
cultivate his temperament, purify his morality and improve his literary and artistic
learning.
The title cao ting shi yi (poetic feeling in a thatched pavilion) composed in the
seal script by Li Dongyang (1447-1516) on the frontispiece suggests the theme of the
painting: literati enjoying the poetic meditation/conversation/company of each other in a
modest but romantic place far from the world.
The visual part of the handscroll depicts a thatched pavilion set on a stage-like
platform in the horizontal center between the foreground and the middle ground. Though
small in size in relation to the objects around it, the pavilion is safely surrounded yet not
crowded by groves of trees, rocks, and several cottages on a gentle slope, leaving
abundant space for the two literati in the pavilion to enter and exit the pavilion as well as
to take a walk in the paths between the pavilion and the natural environment, and
allowing the view to take an imaginative tour effortlessly from the beginning to the end
of the handscroll without losing his/her way.
The highly succinct nature of the brushwork reduces the mimetic character of the
painting to the lowest and as s for the viewers imagination, understanding of the
painting as an allegory of the hermit scholar, and comprehension of the inscription in
which the incentive, title and purpose of the handscroll is explained in detail.
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12
Inscription, Calligraphy and Sealing
Inscription
The artists inscription is recorded in the following literature (in the chronological
order of composition): Wu, Zhen, and Qian Fen(late 17th century), Meidaoren
yi mo [Posthumous Writings of Taoist Plum Blossom] in Cong shu ji cheng
xu bian, Ji bu, Bie ji lei, vol. 109 (Shanghai: Shanghai shu
dian, 1994); Zhen Wu, and Sili Gu (1669-1722), Mei hua an gao: 1 juan [1
volume of Writings in the Hut of Plum Blossom] 1 (Suzhou: Changzhou
Gu shi Xiu ye cao tang, 1702); Bian Yongyu (1645-1712), Shi gu tang shu hua
hui kao [Assembled Shigu Hall Paintings and Calligraphies
Examination] (Wuxing: Jiang shi Mi jun lou cang ben: Jian gu shu she ying yin ren chen,
1922), volume 19; Yu Fengqing (17th century), Shu hua ti ba ji [Records of
Inscriptions on Paintings and Calligraphies] (Shanghai: Shen zhou guo
guang Press, 1911), volume 8; Wang Luoyu(b. 1587), Shan hu wang
(Taipei: Taiwan shang wu yin shu guan, 1983), volume 33.
The inscription, an essential component of a painting, is integral to the work in terms
of not only its literary content, but also its calligraphic merit. The erudite scholar-official
has been an ideal pursued by thousands of years of educated Chinese (from the 2nd
to the
early 20th
century), in the evaluation of whose political talent the mastery of the classic
Chinese prose and poems, history as well as philosophy weighs substantially21
. Aside
21
A more detailed discussion see Patricia Eichenbaum Karetzky, Lehman College Art Gallery and Fisher
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13
from the literary virtuosity, the calligraphic aptitude is also deemed crucial in picking out
the qualified intellectual officials and judging the self-cultivation of a scholar-official.
Since the 4th
century, calligraphy rose to become an art in itself after the advent of the
earliest Chinese characters, the oracle bone script from 14th
BC to 11th
BC.
It gradually became a common practice to compose self-inscriptions on paintings
since the Southern Song and Yuan dynasty. Nevertheless, the self-fashioning function
of Chinese painting may have begun far earlier even than artists started to leave their
names on the painted surfaces on a regular basis: it began as early as the 4th
century, with
the emergence of representational paintings22
.
The inscription (Figure 2) of Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion has been
translated by Wai-kam Ho, Chinese art curator at Cleveland Museum of Art from 1959 to
1983, as follows:
By the side of the hamlet I built a thatched pavilion. Balanced and squared, it
is lofty in conception. The woods being deep, birds are happy; the dust being
distant, bamboos and pines are clean. Streams and rocks invite lingering enjoyment,
lutes and books please my temperament. How should I bid farewell to the world of
the ordinary and the familiar, and let my heart go its own way for the gratification
of my life? In the tenth month of winter, in ding-hai year, the seventh year of Chih-
cheng [1347], I did this Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion playfully for Yan-
Gallery (Bard College), Contemporary Chinese Art and the Literary Culture of China (Bronx, N.Y.:
Lehman College Art Gallery, 1998), 10.
22 For more discussion on the comparison between Chinese artists self-fashioning and that of the artists
in other cultures, see Jonathan Hay, The Functions of Chinese Painting Toward a Unified Field Theory. In Anthropologies of Art, 116, edited by Mari t Westermann Williamstown, Mass. Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute; New Haven: Distributed by Yale University Press, 2005.
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14
tse. Written by Mei sha-mi [Novice of the Plum Blossom].23 K
An artists own inscription, which serves as a kind of personal dedication, will
occasionally, though not always, surpass the work of art itself (whether it be a
handscroll, hanging scroll, album leaf or fan painting) in respect of offering clues to
the appreciation and interpretation of the work and attaching to the original visual
significance another stratum of contextual connotation24
, as is the case with Poetic
Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion:
The inscription offers the subject who built the pavilion (I), the incentive for
building the thatched pavilion (to bid farewell to the world of ordinary and the familiar),
the location and surrounding environment of the pavilion (by the side of the hamlet, in
the deep woods), the activities being conducted in the pavilion (playing the lute and
reading books), and whom the painting is for (Yan-tse/Yuan Ze).
Regarding the person who is responsible for building the pavilion, it is possible that
it was Wu Zhen who built it, and it is also possible that the pavilion may be built by
someone else, and the artist may have composed the painting in memory of the event (as
Ni Zan did with his hanging scroll Rongxi Studio). Though it is unknown who the person
named Yuanze to whom the painting is dedicated is, it is likely that he may have been
the one who built the pavilion (given that Wu Zhen is quite poor himself) and that Wu
Zhen has made this intimate handscroll to celebrate his friends newly-built pavilion. As
the artist noted in the inscription, I did this Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion
playfully for Yan-tse, this might be a reminder that the inscription should not be ta en
23
Wai Kam Ho, http://www.clevelandart.org/collections/collection%20online.aspx?pid={91ADCD8F-
992A-45A5-8599-70835467DF5E}&coid=5701641&clabel=highlights. Accessed November 27, 2012.
24 For a further discussion see Wu Hung, The Double Screen: Medium and Representation in Chinese
Painting (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996), 45.
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15
literally and that the viewer should make allowance for the artists lighthearted humor
and equivocal expression regarding the builder of the pavilion.
The 40-character octave and the 22-character background information (author,
receiver, date, title) produce two rectangular formations (one by the octave, the other by
the background information) that join as an integrated whole.
Regarding the relative position of seals and inscription in Poetic Feeling in a
Thatched Pavilion, similar to several other ascribed Wu Zhen paintings (Fishermans
Idyll, Bamboo and Rock, Twin Junipers, and Mountain among Mountains) in which the
inscription and the seals form a neat whole block (figure 3, figure 4, figure 5, figure 6),
the seals on Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion (the two seals adjacent to and on the
left of the last three characters in the inscription) also form an integrated block formation.
Such formation of the inscription (and seals) agrees with what is commonly seen in
Southern Song and Yuan paintings: the inscription consists of characters confined in a
block, forming a regular unity, with the bottom of each column almost on a same
horizontal line. For example in Zhao Mengfus (1254-1322) Autumn Colors on the Qiao
and Hua Mountains (Figure 7), eight columns of dedication in kaishu (standard script, or
regular script) including the signature Zhao Mengfu zhi (made by Zhao Mengfu) are
included within the last column in order to preserve the block formation, and stress is
placed on the invisible but palpable outer contours or the block25
.
In another work, Mount. Lu (in todays Jiangxi Province, southeast China), painted
by a Southern Song (1127-1279) Zen painter Yujian Rofen, we see that the inscription,
though not as regular as that in Zhao Mengfus painting, is nonetheless placed in clear
25
For more discussion on the shape and formation of the inscriptions see Joan Stanley-Baker, Old Masters
Repainted (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 1995), 160-164.
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16
and neat columns, forming a block, with only one character outside the block. Another
example is a mid-14th
century work by the Yuan master Huang Gongwang: Dwelling in
the Fu-ch n o ntains, where the inscription of the artist lies in a matrix-like formation.
Inscriptions of artists of later generations are composed in a more self-expressive,
irregular non-conformity, for example the one in a 17th
century artist Wang Huis Snowy
Studio in a Mountain Village after Wang Youcheng (Figure 8), where the characters form
irregular heights of columns, separated according to the pauses of the meaning groups
(column one to five from right: Youweng laoren [Wang Shimin] gave me a blank album
and asked for some paintings. At the time I was traveling in Yangzhou and wasn't able to
comply. This spring I received an express letter [from him] so I quickly did these small
scenes after various masters; column six to seven: Your disciple's embarrassing brush and
ink is not worthy of entering your collection; column eight to ten: Done by a rainy
window on the 5th
day of the 2nd
month of jiajin year [March 5, 1674]")26
.
Regarding the signature right after the inscription, we noticed some changes in the
signatures of the works ascribed to Wu Zhen. In the 1328 hanging scroll Twin Junipers,
the signature was Wu Zhen; in the 1342 hanging scroll Fishermans Idyll, the
signature became meihua daoren(literally: Taoist Plum Blossom); in the 1347
handscroll Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion, the signature was mei shami
(literally rmaera27 Plum Blossom). Wu Zhens lineage with Taoism and Buddhism
was recorded in his posthumous anthology meidaoren yimo compiled by his
26
It is contended by Joan Stanley-Baker that it was a practice throughout Yuan for inscription blocks to be
modest and deferential in appearance. See Joan Stanley-Baker, Old Masters Repainted (Hong Kong: Hong
Kong University Press, 1995), p. 161.
27 A rmaera is a novice Buddhist monk.
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17
younger countryman and literati scholar Qian Fen (late 17th century):
Wu Zhen [style name: Zhonggui], with an upright and noble character, was a
master painter in landscapes, bamboos and rocks. His inscription of poems on the
paintings, together with his painting and calligraphy were praised by his
contemporaries as san je (literally: three perfections). He would refuse the rich
who offered to buy his works, yet gifted them to the poor literati. He called himself
meihua daoren (Taoist Plum Blossom) and inscribed on his tombstone pagoda of
meihua heshang (Buddhist Mon Plum Blossom). He died in the middle of the
Hongwu Emperors reign (1368-1398) of the Ming dynasty (Zhongguis pass-
away-year was actually under the Zhizheng Emperors reign from 1341-1370; the
detailed account Duanbei Annals lacked identification text.) The scholar Gao
Xunzhi28
commented that Wu Zhens paintings are li e experienced generals
pluc ing up the banner [of the enemys army , bearing a courageous and heroic
momentum that no man can resist. [I thin [Gaos observation was right to the
point. The word goes that the Wu-district people cherished Zhongguis posthumous
works. [Viewing his works several centuries later, we are impressed with] their
magnificence; one can naturally imagine how striking they once were in the time of
Zhonggui. Suffering from the Yuan invasion, Zhonggui withdrew from the society
and came off as a Taoist. Maybe being a Taoist was his original intention? The
word also goes that Zhongguis elder brother Yuanzhang once studied divination
practice with Tianji Liu, and that Zhonggui also told the good and bad fortune for
people in Wuchuan with the help of I-Ching (Yi-ology) and that his words were
28
Gao Xunzhi , a scholar living in the Chia-ho area at the end of the Yuan dynasty, was called upon in 1370 in the early Ming dynasty as one of the contributors of the History of Yuan.
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18
always cautionary. Was Zhonggui not the group of Junping Yan29
and his like?30 L
The changes in signatures may be explained by the fact that Buddhism,
Confucianism and Taoism merged more in the Yuan dynasty towards a syncretism due to
the Yuan rulers preference for Lamaism, or Tibetan Buddhism. As a nomadic tribe in
northern Asia, the Mongols, conquerors of the Southern Song dynasty and founders of
the Yuan dynasty, like many other nomadic people, held initially a Shamanism belief
filled with rituals and magic, bearing much resemblance to Tibetan Buddhism, which was
soon adopted by the new dynasty.31
Such a preference for Tibetan Buddhism made it
practical for the other three major religions: Buddhism, Confucianism and Taoism to
unite rather than fight with each other. Further, since the Tang dynasty (618-907 A.D.),
Buddhism discarded more of its Indian origin and adapted itself more to the earthly and
materialistic character of Chinese philosophies such as Confucianism and Taoism, and
became more and more secularized.32
Actually the assimilating process started as early as
29
Yan Junping was a Taoist scholar and thinker in the Western Han (202 BCE-9CE) dynasty. He lived in seclusion in Chengdu during the reign of Emperor Cheng (r. 33BC-7BC) of Han dynasty as a
fortune-teller. Known as guiding people in the light of their fateful trend, the people of Shu liked him.
30 Wu Zhen, and Qian Fen(late 17th century), Meidaoren yi mo in Cong shu ji
cheng xu bian, Ji bu, Bie ji lei, vol. 109 (Shanghai: Shanghai shu dian, 1994), 486.
31 For a detailed description see Tsun-yan Liu and Judith Berling, The Three Teachings in the Mongol-
Y an Period, in Y an Thought: Chinese Thought and Religion Under the Mongols (New York: Columbia University Press, 1982), 481-482.
32 Though Indian Buddhism advocated an ascetic life for its believers consisting of no labor and begging
for basic necessities of living; nevertheless, during the Tang dynasty, through the efforts of Huineng, the
sixth Patriarch, and others, Buddhism gradually transformed itself into a religion that repudiates not so
much of profane life: it even encouraged Chinese industriousness (For a detailed description of the
transformation of Buddhism in Tang dynasty China see Yingshi Yu, Zhongguo wen hua shi tong shi, Hong
Kong: Oxford University Press, 2010, 61-67). Another transformation of Buddhism in the Tang dynasty is
the development of Zen Buddhism (which came into being in China in the 6th century A.D.) through
Huinengs teaching that zhi zhi benxin (point directly to the human mind) and jian xing cheng fo (see ones nature and become a Buddha); which, according to the sociologist Robert Bellah, is one of the features of
modern religion, viz. the direct relation between the individual and the transcendent reality (Robert N. Bellah, Religious Evolution, in William A. Lessa and Evon Z. Vogt, Reader in Comparative Religion,
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the Western and Eastern Jin dynasty (265-420 A.D.) when many powers fought with each
other and the people who longed for a united and peaceful nation turned to Buddhism for
hope (Buddhism has been introduced into China at latest in the 1st century A.D.).
Wu Zhens choosing of signatures (or those copied or forged signatures) leads us to
the similar experience of the Yuan painter Ni Zan (who studied Buddhism for a long time
before he converted to the Quanzhen School of Taoism), and Bada Shanren (Zhu Da, ca.
1626-1705) and Shi Tao (Zhu Ruoji, 1642-1707) in the late Ming and early Qing dynasty,
who, originally Buddhists, converted to Taoism (we are not sure whether they totally
abandoned Buddhism) during the last decade of the 17th
century33
, which may also have
resulted from the invasion of the Manchus into China who later established the Qing
dynasty.
Despite the plausible reasoning that Buddhism and Taoism merged into each other
during the turbulent Yuan dynasty, and despite Qian Fens records of Wu Zhen inscribing
on his own tombstone pagoda of meihua heshang (Buddhist Mon Plum Blossom), we
have reason to doubt Wu Zhens Buddhist lineage reflected in his signature mei shami
(Buddhist monk Plum Blossom) in Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion because this
signature is rarely seen in other ascribed Wu Zhen paintings: in pre-1347 (the dated time
of Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion) paintings, such as Twin Junipers (1328),
Mountain among Mountains, Fisherman on Lake Dongting (1341), Fishermans Idyll
(1342), and Eight Views of Jiahe (1344), the signature is meihua daoren (Taoist Plum
Blossom), in the Bamboo and Rock scroll dated 1347, the signature is also mei hua
New York: Narper & Row, 1965, 82. Quoted in Yingshi Yu, Zhongguo wen hua shi tong shi, Hong Kong:
Oxford University Press, 2010, 66).
33 For more investigation of the Taoist conversion of Bada Shanren and Shi Tao, see Jonathan Hay, Shitao:
Painting and Modernity in Early Qing China (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 126-128.
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daoren, and in post-1347 paintings, such as Album of Ink Bamboo Paintings (1348), the
signature is mei lao (the old man Plum Blossom), in the Manual of Ink Bamboo
Paintings (1350), the signature is meihua dao ren. And in paintings without a date,
such as Fisherman on an Autumn River, Spring Dawn on a Clear River, and Fisherman
after Jing Hao, the signature was also meihua daoren. From the representatives of
signatures of the ascribed Wu Zhen paintings, we can see that the most common one is
meihua daoren (Taoist Plum Blossom), and only in Poetic Feeling in a Thatched
Pavilion does the signature mei shami (Buddhist Plum Blossom) appear. This
inconsistency with other attributed paintings signatures is not sufficient for doubting
Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilions authenticity, but it nevertheless renders it more
questionable. If in future there might merge further evidence that might assist in
determining in which period of Wu Zhens life and career this work should fit in terms of
its signature.
Calligraphy
The inscription of the handscroll Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion is written in
the cursive script, consists of 62 characters and has no obvious retouching/reworking
traces. The calligraphic technique called side tip (ce feng) is mostly applied in composing
the inscription, which results in edges and corners in the shape of the characters.
Compared with the visual part of the handscroll in which the mid tip (zhong feng) is
mostly applied, the inscription shows more pointedness than the mellow and round
brushwork seen in the painting (see for example the trees on the left part of the scroll and
the brushstrokes depicting the pavilion). The ink tone of the inscription is also darker
than most parts of the painting. However, the speed with which the artist composed the
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inscription is higher than that with which he made the painting, since the brushwork of
the calligraphy is smoother, more seamless and more varied in width than that of the
painting which is even in width and which seems to drift more slowly, presenting the
viewer with a sense of clumsiness and awkwardness (which is one of the aesthetic
pursuits of the Chinese literati artists in order to differentiate themselves from the
professional painters). In some characters of the inscription, the flying-white (fei bai)
technique, which features broken connections between strokes and which is unique to
half-dry brushwork, is observable: in the character gou (figure 9), duan (figure 10), qing
(figure 11), gong (figure 12), qing (figure 13), he (figure 14), and sha (figure 15). Though
the characters vary a lot from one another in composition, width of brushstroke and ink
tone, they present the viewer a neat and tidy impression in general since each character
occupies an equal share of space, and the spaces between the six columns are also equal
in width.
Compared with other attributed Wu Zhen inscriptions written in the cursive style,
the one in Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion is more in the tradition of the Wang
Xizhi - Mi Fu style of the modern cursive (jin cao) which consists of less direct
connections between brushstrokes and characters (in Poetic Feeling in a Thatched
Pavilion, only the characters qin and shu have a direct connection in brushstrokes),
whereas many other Wu Zhen calligraphy works in the cursive style follow the Zhang Xu
- Huai Su Huang Tingjian tradition of the wild cursive (kuang cao) style which allows
for more direct connections between brushstrokes and characters and gives more artistic
freedom to the calligrapher (see for example Wu Zhens inscription in Fishermans Idyll,
Figure 5, Manual of Bamboo in Monochrome Ink, Figure 16, 17 and 18). The majority of
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22
Wu Zhens calligraphy in the wild cursive style confirms the late Yuan connoisseur Tao
Zongyis comment on Wu Zhens cursive calligraphy that he learned after Gong Guang
who is a follower of the calligrapher Zhang Xu, the Divine Grassist.34
The calligraphy in Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion shows a consistency in the
wielding of the brush and personal style of Wu Zhen, and it also presents some changes
with the time of Wu Zhens artistic career. The uniformity of brush traits can be observed
in comparison with some calligraphy pieces in several other attributed Wu Zhen paintings,
such as the Manual of Bamboo in Monochrome Ink, Bamboo and Rock, Central
Mountains, Fishermans Idyll, and Twin Junipers. The character fang and the character
zhu in both the 20th leaf of Manual of Bamboo in Monochrome Ink (figure 19) and
Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion (figure 20) present similar composition, identical
brush-wielding habit of connections between brushstrokes and the weight-imposing habit
(see the parts in the two characters where the brushstroke become most expansive). The
character mei, wei and fang in Bamboo and Rock (figure 21) and Poetic Feeling in
a Thatched Pavilion (figure 22) also share the similar connection between brushstrokes,
similar omission of certain brushstrokes (the two dots in the character mei and the one dot
in the character wei). Similarly, the characters nian, yue, shu and the phrase xi zuo in
Central Mountains (figure 23) and Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion (figure 24) also
possess consistent composition, simplification and amplification habit (see the position of
the dot in nian in relation to the character, the left part of zuo which is simplified in one
stroke, and the prolonged leftfalling first stroke in yue).
34
Tao Zongyi(fl. 1360-1368), Shu shi hui yao [9 juan, bu yi], Wen yuan ge Si ku quan shu dian zi ban (Xianggang: Di zhi wen hua chu ban you xian gong si; Taibei Shi: Han zhen tu shu suo
ying gong si zong jing xiao, 2006, electronic book, bu yi), 33.
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23
The comparison between the inscriptional calligraphy in Poetic Feeling in a
Thatched Pavilion (1347) with that in Fishermans Idyll (1342) and Twin Junipers (1328)
shows that the calligraphic style in Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion (figure 25) and
Twin Junipers (figure 26) (as well as Central Mountains, Bamboo and Rock, and
Fisherman Recluse on Lake Dongting, 1341, figure 27) are more neat and closer to the
tradition of modern cursive style (jin cao) and the inscription in Fishermans Idyll (figure
28) (as well as the Manual of Bamboo in Monochrome Ink) follows more the lineage of
the wild cursive style (kuang cao). The change in the choice of calligraphy might be
explained by the stylistic change in literati landscape paintings (which emerged in the
early Yuan dynasty and matured in late Yuan and Ming dynasty) from the descriptive
style of the Song to the more expressive style of the Yuan dynasty which is sparse of
detail and economic of means35, which resulted from the unfulfilled ambition to serve
the government using ones erudition and thus the self-exile imposed by the literati
painters who used calligraphic ink plays as an outlet for their depression.
Sealing
Regarding the seals on Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion, the two seals (figure
29) closest to the inscription associated with Wu Zhen are identical with those two seals
that appeared on most of the Wu Zhen attributions. The upper seal reads plum blossom
hut (meihua an ), and the lower one reads Jiaxing Wu Zhen Zhonggui Painting
and Calligraphy Seal (Jiaxing Wu Zhen Zhonggui shu hua yin ).
These two seals appeared frequently in attributed Wu Zhen paintings, as can be seen in
35
Wen C. Fong, Beyond Representation: Chinese Painting and Calligraphy, 8th-14th Century (New York:
Metropolitan Museum of Art; New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992), 432.
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24
for example Fishermans Idyll (1342), Central Mountain (or Mountain among
Mountains, dated 1336, figure 30) and Bamboo and Rock (1347, figure 31).
Among the total of 33 seals on this handscroll, the earliest is from 15th
century (by
Shen Zhou, 1427-1509), 10 seals are from the 17th
century (1 by Li Zhaoheng, act. 1st
half of 17th
century and 9 by Liang Qingbiao, 1620-1691), 1 is from the 19th
century (by
Wang I-jung, 1848-1900), 15 are from the 20th
century (1 by Li Yanshan, 1898-1961, 1
by Huang Wen, and 13 by Chen Rentao). And the frontispiece was composed by the
Ming dynasty poet and government official Li Dongyang (1447-1516).
As we can see, most of the identified seals (as well as the frontispiece) come from
an age much later than Wu Zhens death in 1354, and the majority of people who
stamped their seals lived in the period in and after the 17th
century (when Dong
Qichangs Northern and Southern school theory has become an established orthodox and
Wu Zhen has been recognized according to this theory as one of the four great masters of
the Yuan dynasty). This may be explained by two circumstances: (1) Wu Zhens
remoteness during his lifetime, as Sun Zuo (ca. 1340-1424) commented in his Cang luo
ji According to my observation, Zhonggui is a hermit. His interest is usually in the
mountains and forests, therefore his brushstrokes bear the peaceful and distant character,
and lac the spirit of the aristocrats and their followers.36 Therefore he may not have had
many acquaintances in his lifetime to share his paintings. (2) The unpopularity of Wu
Zhens paintings during his lifetime, as Dong Qichang commented on one of the
fisherman paintings ascribed to Wu Zhen [Wu Zhen was originally living next door to
36
Sun Zuo (14th century), Cang luo ji. Wen yuan ge Si ku quan shu dian zi ban (Xianggang: Di zhi wen hua chu ban you xian gong si; Taibei Shi: Han zhen tu shu suo ying gong si zong jing xiao,
2006, electronic book, volume 3), 6.
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25
Sheng [Mao] Zizhao. The number of people coming from everywhere to purchase [Sheng
Mao Zizhaos paintings with gold and sil is great, whereas [Wu Zhen Zhongguis door
is rarely noc ed on. [Wu Zhens wife therefore laughed at him. [Wu Zhen Zhonggui
said: 'It will not be like this in twenty years.' It turned out to be what Wu Zhen has
predicted.37
The two reasons just cited contributed to the result that when Sun Zuo, a lover of
Wu Zhens paintings, searched in Wu Zhens hometown for three years for his paintings
not long after Wu death, he was frustrated in finding none When I (Sun Zuo) stayed in
Xiuzhou (Jiaxing, Wu Zhens hometown) for three years, and visited all the scholar-
officials to find Wu Zhens paintings, I did not find one. So in the next hundred years,
how few people will know and like his paintings? In the summer of the jiachen year of
the Zhizheng reign (1364), my friend Zhang Xiangnan brought me an ink bamboo
painting from his relative Xuan Los collection and said You have always loved
Zhongguis paintings, please inscribe on it.38 From Sun Zuos recording in his cang luo
ji, Wu Zhen was neither sociable nor well-admired during his life time. Therefore it is
possible that Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion was created by Wu Zhen, but was
little known until Shen Zhou (1427-1509) rediscovered it and composed the colophon
next to the inscription I love the Old Man of the Plum-blossom, who inherited the
secrets of Ch-jan from heart to heart. In cultivating this "water and ink kinship" he was
able to endow everything with a touch of aged mellowness. Trees and rocks seem to fall
37
Yu Fengqing (17th century), Yu Fengqing Shu hua ti ba ji [Records of Inscriptions on Paintings and Calligraphies] (Shanghai: Shen zhou guo guang Press, 1911, volume 8), 8.
38 Sun Zuo (14th century), Cang luo ji. Wen yuan ge Si ku quan shu dian zi ban (Xianggang:
Di zhi wen hua chu ban you xian gong si; Taibei Shi: Han zhen tu shu suo ying gong si zong jing xiao,
2006, electronic book, volume 3), 6-7.
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26
from his brush [so effortlessly] that even nature itself could hardly deny their emergence.
So now, under the grove of the oak trees, I am willing to serve him with all humility.
Shen Chou, a later follower.39
Visual analysis
When entering the handscroll from the lower right corner where a series of mounds
with moss on them in the foreground and a grove of trees in the background leave
between them a path in the middle ground for the viewer to travel through, the viewer is
directed to enter a level pictorial plane where the slightly tilted mounds in the foreground
and the sparse vegetation in the background are not far away from each other, which
suggests the shallow depth and intimate character of the handscroll. The viewer then
encounters a comparatively prominent element, a huge Taihu stone in the middle ground
next to the mounds. The porous scholars roc may not be as tall as it seems, but its
position in the middle ground renders it larger than the groves of trees in the background
to its right. Here the natural elements (mounds, trees) meet the human elements (the
scholars roc ). The prominence of the scholars roc may be a hint for the viewer who
will soon discover the true theme of the painting to be the scholars retreat instead of a
larger landscape. Before encountering the thatched pavilion which is the center of the
pictorial plane, the viewers encounter with the scholars roc (which takes the place of
the central mountain that usually occupies the dominant position in a landscape painting
following the high distance scheme) may make him more aware of the intimate nature
of the painting, and thus not expecting any towering elements which are frequently
thought of as essential to a Chinese landscape painting. The rugged contour of the
39
Translated by Wai-kam Ho. http://www.clevelandart.org/art/1963.259.
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27
scholars roc resembles the shape of the barren mountains that bear more stones than
vegetation and are typical for the landscape in north China, as depicted in Guo Xis Early
Spring.
The scholars roc immensity and its combination with the thatched pavilion remind
one of Wang Mengs Bamboo Cottage by Lake Tai/Retreat at Ju-qu (Figure 32) in which
the huge and odd-loo ing scholars roc s serve to accentuate the unique scenery by La e
Tai and hint at the hermit scholars life in nature. Similar the foreground rocks in Wang
Mengs Bamboo Cottage by Lake Tai, where the rocks serve as a visual device that acts
as an extension of the mountains around the lake and help shape the waterway (and thus
offers an accessible path for the viewer), the scholars roc in Poetic Feeling in a
Thatched Pavilion also serves as an extension of the mounds and helps lead the viewer to
travel past it and arrive at the thatched pavilion. Here the scholars roc functions as
obstructive scenery (zhang jing) which frequents the plan of the private gardens in
southeast China and which temporarily blocks the view of the visitor so that the sceneries
will be not revealed all at once and adds steps and flavor to the viewing experience.
Though the two scholars are only conversing in the bower, we can imagine them drinking
tea or tasting wine and viewing the distant landscape through the porous surfaces of the
scholars rock in front of the pavilion while the vapor of the hot tea or wine which looks
like mist circling mountainsides blurs the contours of the rock.
When the viewer has passed the scholars roc and travels on, he arrives at the
thatched pavilion in the middle ground in which two scholars are conversing on two stone
stools and two servants are waiting for them outside the pavilion. Here the foreground
elements are reduced to minimum and more trees and vegetation appear in the
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28
background which, though taller than the rightmost grove, do not appear protruding for
their crowns reach only up to three-quarters of the vertical space. There is also some
space between the groves of trees which leaves more room for the pavilion. The grove
scene combined with the inscription the woods being deep, birds are happy leads the
viewer to imagine sparrows twittering in the copses and cranes rambling outside the
pavilion and resting beside the rocks.
The brushwork depicting the pavilion and the figures is concise and allusive instead
of representational: several long, dark, continuous strokes sketch the roof and four pillars
of the pavilion; shorter, lighter, denser brushstrokes describe the thatched nature of the
roof and depict the floor and the platform supporting the pavilion made of chunks of
stones; brief, dark brushstrokes are applied to depict the four human figures, their gowns
and headgear and staff, but the brushwork is so concise that no facial features or
expressions are readable.
The two scholar figures are tiny in size and are enclosed in the pavilion in the stage-
like open and spacious middle ground among the trees, mounds and rocks. The figures
are small and surrounded by trees and mounds and thus are reminiscent of Zhao
Mengfus The Mind Landscape of Xie Youyu (Figure 33), where the Western Jin scholar
Xie Youyus (280-322) simple and tiny figure is encircled yet not concealed by the
groves and natural scenery around him. Although the trees and the scholars roc in
Poetic Feeling in a Thatched Pavilion are all larger in size than the thatched pavilion, all
the natural elements serve as a backdrop of the pavilion and the human figures inside it,
for all the trees and the rock seem to be making way for the pavilion, receding and