Collection of the University of Pittsburgh Art Gallery, Pittsburgh, PA.
1988.08.001
Boundless View of Mountains with Foliage
18th century (Date created)
Ink
Painting
Scrolls
43.5 in W
x
120 in H
(Object)
Chinese
In the year 353 A.D., the great prose author of the Ts'in dynasty (265-420 A.D.) Wang Hsi-
chih (321-379 A.D.) went on an outing with his friends. The group drank wine and wrote poems
about their literati outings at the Orchid Pavillion. Wang compiled the many poems written by his friends into a famous work, “Lan 'I"in g Chi ,” or the “Orchid Pavillion Collection.” The popularity of this collection is due to the poetic and profound preface written by Wang Hsi-chih.
In it he describes the outing with his friends, the beauty of the landscape, and he contemplates the brevity and meaninglessness of life, concluding that our human existence is inconsequential and that this fact is one ink between all generations of people, past, present, and future. Many emperors requested that their court painters express visually the beauty of this essay. In the inscription on the painting, the artist Ts'ai-Chia writes that he had been dissatisfied with the results of previous artists and that this painting serves as his attempt to convey the true depth and meaning of Wang Hsi~chih‘s poem. The careful, detailed brushstrokes of the painting are hallmarks of the academic style of painting in China. The composition, the brushstrokes used to define the leaves, and the tall, thin mountains in the background, which are described by light washes of ink, are all borrowed from the Ming dynasty‘s Che school (c. 1430-1505), perhaps the source of the painting's academic style.
Ts'ai Chia was a Ch'ing dynasty painter who quit his job as a silversmith at a young age so
that he could study painting. Before he was thirty he had made a name for himself. He is
remembered for his skill at painting flowers, mountains, birds, insects, and fish, and is especially well known for his landscapes in the blue-green style of the T'ang dynasty (618-9_07 A.D.).
From exhibition label by Charlotta McKown.
chih (321-379 A.D.) went on an outing with his friends. The group drank wine and wrote poems
about their literati outings at the Orchid Pavillion. Wang compiled the many poems written by his friends into a famous work, “Lan 'I"in g Chi ,” or the “Orchid Pavillion Collection.” The popularity of this collection is due to the poetic and profound preface written by Wang Hsi-chih.
In it he describes the outing with his friends, the beauty of the landscape, and he contemplates the brevity and meaninglessness of life, concluding that our human existence is inconsequential and that this fact is one ink between all generations of people, past, present, and future. Many emperors requested that their court painters express visually the beauty of this essay. In the inscription on the painting, the artist Ts'ai-Chia writes that he had been dissatisfied with the results of previous artists and that this painting serves as his attempt to convey the true depth and meaning of Wang Hsi~chih‘s poem. The careful, detailed brushstrokes of the painting are hallmarks of the academic style of painting in China. The composition, the brushstrokes used to define the leaves, and the tall, thin mountains in the background, which are described by light washes of ink, are all borrowed from the Ming dynasty‘s Che school (c. 1430-1505), perhaps the source of the painting's academic style.
Ts'ai Chia was a Ch'ing dynasty painter who quit his job as a silversmith at a young age so
that he could study painting. Before he was thirty he had made a name for himself. He is
remembered for his skill at painting flowers, mountains, birds, insects, and fish, and is especially well known for his landscapes in the blue-green style of the T'ang dynasty (618-9_07 A.D.).
From exhibition label by Charlotta McKown.
In Collection
Donated by Joseph F. and Carolyn M. Novak
Please note that cataloging is ongoing and that some information may not be complete.