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Unidentified artist
On view at The Met Fifth Avenue in Gallery 213
Scholars of the Liuli Hall commemorates a famous gathering hosted by the poet Wang Changling (act. ca. 713-41) at his official residence in Jiangning (modern Nanjing, Jiangsu Province). An earlier, cut-down version of the same composition, entitled simply Literary Gathering (Palace Museum, Beijing), is attributed to Han Huang (723-787). The costumes and the style in which the figures are drawn, however, relate these works to Zhou Wenju, the great Southern Tang (937-75) court painter who used a "tremulous brush line" (zhanbi) to draw drapery.
In the Metropolitan's scroll, Zhou's tenth-century style has been transformed by a thirteenth-century artist. The sensitively drawn faces are late Song in style; while more schematic than Tang (618-907) examples, they are more solidly and three-dimensionally conceived than those of the late Ming (16th-17th century). In describing the figures' robes, Zhou Wenju's "tremulous brush line" has become a virtuoso performance: elegant fluttering lines, at once playful and confident, are well integrated, and the hooks and curves representing creases and pockets show an extravagant realism matched only by the best late Southern Song Academy figure painters.
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detail
section 8, colophon
section 1, frontispiece
section 2, frontispiece
section 3, frontispiece
section 4
section 5
section 6
section 7, colophon
entire scroll
detail
detail
Artwork Details
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南宋 佚名 舊傳 五代周文矩琉 璃堂人物圖 卷
Title: Scholars of the Liuli Hall
Artist: Unidentified artist Chinese, late 13th century
Period: Southern Song dynasty (1127–1279)
Date: late 13th century
Culture: China
Medium: Handscroll; ink and color on silk
Dimensions: Image: 12 3/8 × 50 9/16 in. (31.4 × 128.4 cm)
Overall with mounting: 15 1/8 in. × 27 ft. 5 1/2 in. (38.4 × 836.9 cm)
Classification: Paintings
Credit Line: Gift of Mrs. Sheila Riddell, in memory of Sir Percival David, 1977
Accession Number: 1977.49
Learn more about this artwork
Timeline of Art History
Chronology
Central and North Asia, 1000-1400 A.D.
Chronology
China, 1000-1400 A.D.
Museum Publications
Issues of Authenticity in Chinese Painting
Beyond Representation: Chinese Painting and Calligraphy, Eighth–Fourteenth Century
"Silent Poetry: Chinese Paintings in the Douglas Dillon Galleries"
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