Travel Across China

Fall 2020

For the Art of China Course at Arizona State University

Exhibition Proposal

Title: Travel Across China

Dates: April 4th – November 7th

Proposal:

Throughout China’s history nature has been a part of its core culture, as artists have both painted and written what they have seen around them and have inspired their imaginations. “Travel Across China” takes a look at the different landscapes of China throughout multiple dynasties and seen by twelve artists. Each artist, with their own style, both influenced by the past and the present, shows their own view of the natural world around them.

Seen through the eyes of the landscape painters throughout China’s history, the visitor will travel across China from the Xiao and Xiang Rivers to the Mountains of Qingbian as they move from one Chinese landscape to the next. The visitor will see mountains, rivers, temples, boats, and much more, even as the seasons change. The many views of China will be opened up by these twelve paintings, both as hanging scrolls and handscrolls, to share with the visitor the beauty of China’s vast landscapes and love of nature. The journey will not just be across China, but also through China’s history as styles changed from one dynasty to the next with most of these views coming from the turbulent times between the Tang (618-906) and Yuan (1260-1368) Dynasties. As a whole, “Travel Across China” will showcase some of the prominent landscape painters, such as Guo Xi, Dong Yuan, Mi Youren, Dong Qichang, and others from the Tang Dynasty (618-906) to the Qing Dynasty (1644-1912). Inspired by nature, these noteworthy painters painted what they saw both around them in nature and within their minds. And as visitors to this exhibition, they will get to travel to these places that the painters of the past wished to share with others.

Included Works:

Sailing Boats and a Mount Kuanglu, A Solitary Temple Amid

Riverside Mansion, Jing Hao, ca. 900, Clearing Peaks,

Li Sixun, 185.8 x 106.8 cm Li Cheng, ca. 960,

111.4 x 56 cm

Scenery Along the Xiao and Xiang Rivers,

Dong Yuan, 10th century, 50 x 141 cm

Cloudy Mountains, Mi Youren, 1130, 43.4 x 194.3 cm

Early Spring, The Simple Retreat, Returning Home Late

Guo Xi, 1072, Wang Meng, from a Spring Outing,

158 x 108 cm ca. 1370, Dai Jin, Ming Dynasty,

136.5 x 44.8 cm 167.9 x 83.1 cm

Twelve Views of Landscape, Xia Gui, ca. 1225, 28 x 230 cm

Dwelling in the Fuchen Mountains, Huang Gongwang, 1347 – 1350, 33 x 636.9 cm

In the Method of Fan Kuan’s Landscape, Collaborative Album of Flowers and Landscapes, Wang Hui, Qing Dynasty, 17th century, 28.5 x 43.1 cm

The Qingbian Mountains,

Dong Qichang

Labels

A Solitary Temple Amid Clearing Peaks

Li Cheng (919-967)

Northern Song Dynasty (960-1126), China, ca. 960

Hanging scroll, ink and slight color on silk

43.86 x 22.05 in (111.4 x 56 cm)

Purchase: William Rockhill Nelson Trust

Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City

ASU.5932.12

Set amongst a rising mountainous landscape with waterfalls and rivers, a small wooden bridge leads to vast temple secluded from the outside world. “Crab claw” trees, as they are sometimes described, help to further hide this solitary temple amidst “cloudlike” soft mountains. The depth of this landscape as the strong lines of the bridge slowly begin to fade as the viewer comes to the temple. Soon after, departing the temple to look into the distant landscape, the rising mountains fade even more drastically behind mist and clouds with some of their peaks showing high above the temple.

Li Cheng, influenced by Jing Hao and Guan Tong, later developed his own style in which he primarily loved to depict winter landscapes. The style of painting seen in Li Cheng’s work is reminiscent of one of the many different styles during the Northern Song Dynasty that continued to slightly disappear and then reappear throughout the rest of China’s history becoming a significant style of traditional landscape paintings. Li Cheng’s influenced many later landscape painters including Guo Xi.

Cloudy Mountains

Mi Youren (1052-1107)

Southern Song Dynasty (1127-1279), China, 1130

Handscroll, ink, lead white, and slight color on silk

17.09 x 76.5 in (43.4 x 194.3 cm)

Purchase: J.H. Wade Fund

The Cleveland Museum of Art

ASU.5939.02

On a cloudy day, the vast mountain range, surrounded by lakes and rivers, peaks their heads above the clouds giving the feeling of floating islands. From the center of the landscape, a grove of trees sits on the tip of the land as it touches the larger lake. The trees give way to a winding river that leads to an unknown location in the vast mountain range almost hiding behind the thick clouds. As the viewer eyes travel deeper into the landscape, the mountains seem to fade into the distance, blending with the thick white clouds.

Mi Youren was a scholar-painter who continued and developed the style of his father, Mi Fu. The “Mi-dot” style utilized wet ink to blob and dot the silk or paper canvas creating soft misty landscapes reminiscent of southern landscapes that both the father and son knew well. In this painting, Mi Youren features the misty southern landscape by emphasizing the thick clouds that descend upon this vast mountain landscape.

Twelve Views of Landscape

Xia Gui (ca. 1180-1224)

Southern Song Dynasty (1127-1279), China, ca. 1225

Handscroll, ink on silk

11.02 x 90.55 in (28 x 230 cm)

Purchase: William Rockhill Nelson Trust

Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City

ASU.5941.05

Viewed from right to left, the misty landscape overlooks the banks where fishermen have already set out for the day on their boats. As the viewer travels across the landscape following the river a rock outcropping covered in trees unshrouded by mist rests before the river partially blocking the view of the river. As the viewer continues to follow the river, the rocky landscape opens up with a view of another bank partially shrouded in mist across the river with a couple of larger sail boats docked on the shore. The river continues out of sight behind a small rocky mountain. The journey of the landscape follows the river where fishermen and sailboats come and go.

Working the Southern Song court, Xia Gui alongside Ma Yuan, co-founded the Ma-Xia School, which typically held a composition that was heavier to one side or corner. This is evident as the viewer moves from right to left with the landscape becoming more and more vivid and less shrouded in mist.

Returning Home Late from a Spring Outing

Dai Jin (1388-1462)

Ming Dynasty (1368-1644), China

Hanging scroll, ink and colors on silk

66.1 x 32.72 in (167.9 x 83.1 cm)

National Palace Museum, Taipei

ASU.5950.97

A person arrives late during a nice spring day to a residence hidden behind trees and a wall in the lower right of the seen landscape. The latecomer after crossing a bridge knocks on the doors of the gate, while a servant holding a lamp comes towards the door from the inner residence once the he hears the knocking. Others returning home after a long day’s work walk along the paths and bridges. In the distance, across the winding river are other residences coming out of the mist and possibly others not seen as they are shrouded in the low settling mist. In the furthest distance seen by the viewer, a large mountain covered in trees breaks through the mist to reveal its high terrain.

Dai Jin had based his style on the Ma-Xia School, but his expressiveness took him further into his own style. His composition resembles that of an academic painter during the Southern Song, and his prominent use of the surface rather than space is common among the Zhe School painters. Even with influences from previous and current painters, Dai Jin pushed his own style developing it further into a more mature style that has sometimes influenced later landscape painters.

Gallery Installation Plan