Selections
Returning Late from a Spring Outing
Tai Chin (1388-1462), Ming dynasty
Hanging scroll, ink and colors on silk, 167.9 x 83.1 cm
Tai Chin, a native of Ch'ien-t'ang (Hangchow) in Chekiang, went by the style name Wen-chin and the sobriquets Ching-an and Yü-ch'üan shan-jen. At one point he was recommended to serve the court as a painting master at the capital. His style fused the inherited traditions of Ma Yüan and Hsia Kuei of the Southern Sung (1127-1279) with the Li Ch'eng and Kuo Hsi school from the Northern Sung (960-1127), establishing a foundation for the Che landscape manner in the Ming dynasty.
This work depicts a scene at dusk as farmers with hoes over their shoulders make their way home along a path in the middleground. In the foreground is a walled enclosure with overhanging peach blossoms that indicate the season is spring. A scholar knocks at the door as an attendant carries a lamp in response, representing a poetic scene of a master returning home late. Although the style is based on the Southern Sung Ma-Hsia manner, lush effects of brush and ink are more emphasized to create various spirited transformations that reveal the hand of Tai Chin. It has been speculated that this work was done during his stay in Peking.
Falcon in Autumn
Lin Liang (ca. 1424-after 1500), Ming dynasty
Hanging scroll, ink and colors on silk, 136.8 x 74.8 cm
Lin Liang, a native of Nan-hai in Kwangtung, also went by the style name I-shan and was mostly active during the T'ien-shun (1457-1463) and early Ch'eng-hua (1465-1487) reigns. He excelled at using unbridled monochrome ink washes without outlines to capture the fleeting movement of animals, becoming one of the major bird-and-flower painters at the Ming court after Pien Wen-chin (ca. 1356-ca. 1428).
With fierce eyes and talons ready, the falcon shown here has flipped over in mid-flight to make a nosedive for its prey. The mynah bird it is pursuing scrambles to get away and seems stricken with fear. The painter used quick strokes of brush and ink to render the tree branches spanning the composition, the downward bend echoing the line of the falcon's flight. The energetic details of the leaves add an even greater atmosphere of tension that permeates the painting.
Peacocks and Apricot Blossoms
Lü Chi (ca. 1429-ca. 1505), Ming dynasty
Hanging scroll, ink and colors on silk, 203.4 x 110.6 cm
Lü Chi, style name T'ing-chen and sobriquet Le-yü, entered the court in the late Ch'eng-hua era (between 1470 and 1480) and was highly appreciated by Emperor Hsiao-tsung in the Hung-chih reign (1488-1505), his style becoming one representative of court taste in painting at the time.
Depicted in this work is an elegant apricot tree in full bloom next to two gorgeous peacocks standing on a rock and surrounded by red and white peony blossoms. Sparrows flit about the tips of the tree branches to give the painting an opulent and refined quality that conveys an overall sense of elegance without being too gaudy or rowdy. Apricot blossoms are a symbol of spring, while the peacock and peony represent wealth. Even the word for "sparrow" is a homophone for the character meaning "nobility," symbolizing rank and title. Thus, this rich and opulent painting takes on even more auspicious connotations.
Five Deer
Attributed to Ch'en Ch'un (1483-1544), Ming dynasty
Hanging scroll, ink and colors on silk, 152.5 x 202.2 cm
This work has been traditionally attributed to the Ming painter Ch'en Ch'un, but the style is actually close to that of "Pines and Deer" by Wang Chao currently in a Japanese private collection. Therefore, this painting is also thought to have come from the brush of Wang Chao. Wang Chao (fl. early to mid-16th c.), style name Te-ch'u and sobriquet Hai-yün, was a native of Hsiu-ning in Anhwei who went sometime before 1519 to Nanking to advance his career as a painter.
In this hanging scroll, five deer appear in an intimate, mist-shrouded rustic scene huddled together with three of them looking at the large deer in the middle. The brushwork of the surrounding pines, rocks, flowers and grasses, and clouds and mist is coarse and quick, the overall effect revealing that Wang Chao excelled at using a sea of clouds to generate a magical atmosphere of transformation. The combination of deer and pines, a play on words, is commonly used as an auspicious blessing for wealth and longevity.