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This piece of art is called "Dwelling in the Mountains" 1235(?), made by the famous 4th century calligrapher, Quin Xuan. This piece is slightly cropped, what is shown is a painting that illustrates mountains which are surrounded by water, and the mountains are surrounding which could be a yurt of some type of building. As we have learned in class, you can conclude that this is done by the artist Qian Xuan because of his use of colors (blue and green) and his use of his brush. It can be seen he makes washes surrounding the background of the painting, by using a bigger ratio fo water than water based paint near the top of the mountains. Upon research, the context of this piece could potentially be a way of expressing mind landscape, or something he has seen before with his own eyes, and soon put it onto paper; or because of his familiar practice in archaism, he had portrayed, in an expressional way, the history of the "Golden Age" in Chinese History (Tang History). If you look at his work, you can noticed his popular use of fine line, used on the structure in the middle of the mountains and details of the trees, and like said prior, his washes of colors seen above the mountains. In the midground, you can also notice the exquisite detail in the trees behind the structure, which may have been made using his brush in a particular way.

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 Zhao Mengfu - Art Piece - 1296 - Week 2

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 Zhao Mengfu - Art Piece - 1296 - Week 2

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This painting is called Man and Horse (1296), made by the famous Zhao Mengfu (1254-1322). Zhao was a Yuan Dynasty painter who was claimed a traditionalist and an artist that many were not a fan of due to his collaboration with the foreign rulers. This was because at this time it was under rule of the Mongol, yet he was a descendant under the Song Dynasty. This piece gives emotional impact more due to his reality of what was happening during this time, other than expressing it as many other artists did through nature. The theme of the groom and horse-one associated with the legendary figure of Bole, whose ability to judge horses had become a metaphor for the recruitment off government officials-became a symbolic plea for the use of raw and real art.

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This piece of art work Landscape (1622) is done by the famous literati painter Dong Qichang (1555-1636). Qichang was born in Hauting, part of the Shanghai Dynasty and was extremely intelligent, with holding the highest achieving court examination. He visited relatively often to visit his other painter friends and had developed the Huating school of painting. As we discussed in class, Qichang has a lot of different features that we see compared to the other artists we have covered. He leaves room for imagination, with use of shapes to compose forms or shapes, unique brush methods for creating those forms/shapes, and especially his use of "empty spots" that is purposely meant to confuse your mind. That can be seen towards the top of the image with his very open negative space in one of his shapes/forms that makes you wonder, why did he put that there?

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Zhe vs. Wu School - Wen Zhengming - Week 4

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Zhe vs. Wu School - Wen Zhengming - Week 4

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Wen Zhengming, (1470-1559), was an artist   of the Ming Dynasty. He was apart of the Wu School. Out of artists that I have seen, I believe Zhengming has the most varied stylistic features within all his paintings. One of his popular piece of works is Seven Junipers, which is a painting of a very "popular" tree in China. It uses heavy interest in detail and complex for the mind to think about. Although, this piece called Old Trees, is also a painting of trees but looks very different than Seven Junipers. Yet, both of these paintings has his stylistic features of detailed texture with dry brush to capture the detailed look. This piece was on a hand scroll with ink. This work of art uses dark ink, but lighter tones are not seen as much in his other paintings. I enjoy Zhengming's pieces because of his intentions of complexity to not only capture naturalism, but to "confuse" the viewer and extend their thoughts about nature and his works.

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Traditional Chinese Structure - Imperial Garden - Week 5

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Traditional Chinese Structure - Imperial Garden - Week 5

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The Imperial Garden has many work of arts and architecture, and is located in the Forbidden City, after the gate of Terrestrial Tranquility. There are 4 pavilions in the corners, which symbolizes each season. In the garden is there is poetry, writings, paintings and many Juniper Trees. This Imperial Garden was built to create a space for emperors to hang out with their wives, and rituals were also done here. Upon research, there is also paintings of wives abusing their husbands, which would be considered strange during this time of male domination.

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Badashanren: Badashanren was one of the Great 4 Monks of the Qing Dynasty. His birth name is Zhu Da, and he was a descendent of the Ming Dynasty. Growing up he enjoyed the wealth and royalty until the fall of the dynasty, and because of the fall he went silent. He made a vow of silence for 10 years, and proclaimed his self as dumb by plastering this word all over his door. He soon became "insane" from his long devotion to silence, but it was thought it was all pretend. Once he grew older and found peace, he started painting and signed his name with intertwined characters of Laugh and Cry. In this piece, Stag and Pine, his stylistic features are easy to see. His use of bold ink and the contrast between wet and dry brush allows detail, yet makes his work have a minimalistic look. Badashanren also uses smudges of ink to create form, which is seen under the deer.

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Eccentrics: Gao Qipei vs. Huan Yan - Week 7

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Eccentrics: Gao Qipei vs. Huan Yan - Week 7

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Both of these artists were a part of the Eccentrics but also had a few differences between their stylistic features. In the painting of the animals fleeing, there was closer detail than the standard landscape paintings of Qipei’s. Throughout Chinese Art we have learned so far, we have not seen nature in its raw form or what it’s like within the mountains. Qipei’s paintings mostly consisted of landscapes other than closely detailed works. This was mostly due to Qipei’s use of brush, which was very different from the rest of the artists through Chinese history. With the use of the brush, detail is created much easier other than using a fingernail. Hua Yan showed a visually expressive and descriptive situation in the Animals Fleeing, and in Qipei’s work, his overall mindset was simplicity and naturalistic energy throughout his work. Overall, one major difference between Hua Yan and Gao Qipei was Yan’s more characteristic and methodic expression throughout his paintings.

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Tale of Genji Story - Week 8 - Around 794

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Tale of Genji Story - Week 8 - Around 794

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This was a work of art done by the artist who created Emakimono. A lady who kept a diary of a life at court, which the Tale of Genji was based on, made a tale that was soon copied and put into scrolls that were named Emakimono. This tale is quite large, with 54 chapters, and 1 to 3 pictures per. Unfortunately, we can only see 20 in total today. Yet it is believed by scholars that 5 different artists worked on this project. One is specifics, a pigment artist, had the duty of applying pigments using a technique called tsukuri-e. The meaning of the word is build up, or make up your face, applies to the techniques of onno-e and otoko-e. The other artists in this work of art is a noblemen, calligrapher and cultural analysists, and a principle artist who works with black ink and made notes about how the colors should be used. As in the title, the story is Genji betrayed his father by falling in love when he was younger with his father's youngest wife and ended up impregnating her. The child was a boy and passed off as the emperors own and actually ended up ruling. But, karma hit Genji.

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What you see above is a piece of emakimono. This a continuous form of art, because the drawings make a story from right to left. There is no text in Animal scroll, and it is an example of otoko-e style due to bold line work, and lots of expression. This might be published by a Buddhist clergy but it illustrates animals playing anarchy to represent different classes. Monkeys were dressed as Shinto priests, which is apart of nature religion, monkeys with straw hats were farmers and others animals with black caps represented aristocrats and the unclothed were commoners. In this scene above, the frog looks like it was killed because between all the animals, they were trying to catch the culprit. The function of this scroll was to be satire poking fun of groups that were other than the Buddhist clergy, yet this is suspected and not established.

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I have found a piece of work that portrays four scenes from the Hell Scrolls of Jigoku Zoshi. The first scene on the top left is the Hell of Excrement, which depicts sinners boiled in polluted liquid, and worms picking at their bones. The one to the left is the Hell of Measures, which depicts men being burned and forced to count hot iron pieces and measure their weight. This was because of cheating in business in the real world. Right below this piece was the Hell of Mortars, sinners were simply grinded up and pulverized. On the bottom, this scene, Hell of the Flaming Rooster, depicts those who harm animals when they were alive; the sinners are placed in a huge chamber of chickens that are in flames and they chase the sinners around. These grotesque paintings made viewers contemplate to remind them if they kept pessimistic, they would suffer through what the paintings depicted. This scroll is also otoko-e. Otoko-e style is “men’s pictures”, which is more extroverted and conveys high emotion. This style also creates genre scenes, like breastfeeding or everyday scenes, and is usually monochromatic or lightly colored. Otoko-e relies on a strong dynamic calligraphic line for the basis of composition within the painting.

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Zen Buddhism in Japan - Catch a Catfish with a Gourd - Week 11

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Zen Buddhism in Japan - Catch a Catfish with a Gourd - Week 11

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This very blurry image was a piece of work done by a Japanese artist named Josestu, called Catch a Catfish with a Gourd. This artist has a Chinese style of work by using blank space, very naturalistic and theme of river or fishing. This makes it very distinctive. Josestu lived in a temple and this is the only surviving painting by him. But what is illustrated is a man who is too small to catch a large catfish, and what makes this so unique is the detail of the man. His face has features that makes him look like catfish, and his sleeves are pulled up high enough to make it look like fins. This applies to the term Koan, which is the idea of an irrational thought and trying to make a rational answer out of it. In this particular scene, the rational thought could be to catch the catfish, become the catfish. The gourd is almost like a deception or to make another distinctive thought.

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In the picture, a young woman is seen performing a ritual called chanoyu. The elements of the ritual in the spaces, or the tea rooms, were chigaidana-a, tsuke-shoin and shoji. Chigaidana-a is a group of shelves interconnected at different lengths. Tsuke-shoin is a shallow alcove with a wide ledge. Lastly, shoji is sliding windows that soon lead into the tearoom. In the development of this ritual, an important influence was the tea master Sen no Rikyu, He is the son of a merchant and served as a tea master to Nobunaga, then for Hideyoshi. Both rulers participated in these rituals to prove themselves and demonstrate their “cultural sophistication” of their right to rule. Sen no Rikyu also had an influence on the cutlery of the practice of the tea ceremony, like a bamboo ladle, tea scoop and tea whisk that are locally made ceramics. Sen enjoyed simplicity. Most importantly in the ritual is Raku ware. Rake ware is what individuals use to drink tea out of, and raku means “pleasure”. If you were to a view a raku ware, it is obvious it is not perfect. The edges aren’t well rounded, bubbles in the glaze and it is fired in a single oxidation kiln at low temperatures. By removing it early from the kiln, it introduces the concept of enlightenment in Zen Buddhism, which is also called Wasi Sabi.

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Edo - Hishikawa Moronobu, Scenes in a theatre tea-house - Week 13

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Edo - Hishikawa Moronobu, Scenes in a theatre tea-house - Week 13

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This piece of work is done by the famous Japanese artist of the Edo Period, Hishikawa Moronobu (c. 1620-1694). The Edo Period was a time when Tokugawa Ieyasu became the new shogun, and under his power for a whole 250 years. During this period the Chonin, which were classy wealthy merchants and artists, were trying to get good business and their art expressed no appreciation for "the glories of the past". What I find really cool about this piece of work is how Ukiyo-e school makes paintings about the urban life during the Edo period. I am assuming this is a Kabuki theater because of the title "Hishikawa Moronobu, Scenes in a theatre tea-house", and all theatre houses had performances, only done by men during this period. In the mid ground you can also see the fusuma, which is a sliding door in these theatre tea houses which we learned in class.