Many critics consider landscape to be the highest form of Chinese painting. By the late Tang Dynasty (618-907), landscape painting
had evolved into an independent genre that embodied the universal
longing of cultivated men to escape their quotidian world to commune
with nature. As the Tang Dynasty disintegrated, the concept of
withdrawal into the natural world became a major thematic focus of
poets and painters. Faced with the failure of the human order, learned
men sought permanence within the natural world, retreating into the
mountains to find a sanctuary from the chaos of dynastic collapse.
The time from the Five Dynasties period to the Northern Song period (907-1127) is known as the "Great age of Chinese landscape". In the north, artists such as Fan Kuan (範寬) and Guo Xi (郭熙) painted pictures of towering mountains, using strong black lines, ink wash, and sharp, dotted brushstrokes to suggest rough stone. In the south, Dong Yuan (董源) and Juran (巨然) painted the rolling hills and rivers of their native countryside in peaceful scenes done with softer, rubbed brushwork. These two kinds of scenes and techniques became the classical styles of Chinese landscape painting.
In the Song Dynasty (960-1279), landscapes of
more subtle expression appeared; immeasurable distances were conveyed
through the use of blurred outlines, mountain contours disappearing
into the mist, and impressionistic treatment of natural phenomena.
Emphasis was placed on the spiritual qualities of the painting and on
the ability of the artist to reveal the inner harmony of man and
nature, as perceived according to Taoist and Buddhist concepts.
Under the Mongol Yuan Dynasty (1271-1368), when many educated Chinese
were barred from government service, the model of the Song literati
retreat evolved into a full-blown alternative culture as this
disenfranchised elite transformed their estates into sites for literary
gatherings and other cultural pursuits. These gatherings were
frequently commemorated in paintings that, rather than presenting a
realistic depiction of an actual place, conveyed the shared cultural
ideals of a reclusive world through a symbolic shorthand in which a
villa might be represented by a humble thatched hut. Because a man's
studio or garden could be viewed as an extension of himself, paintings
of such places often served to express the values of their owner.
Painting was no longer about the description of the visible world; it
became a means of conveying the inner landscape of the artist's heart
and mind. The most famous painters of this period include Zhao Mengfu (趙孟頫), and the Four Masters of the Yuan, namely Huang Gongwang (黃公望), Wang Meng (王蒙), Ni Zan (倪瓚), and Wu Zhen (吳鎮).
Famous Paintings: