Bamboo in Snow
3 min readPainter: XuXi
Painting Year: the Five Dynasties
Material: silk scroll
Dimension: vertical length of 151.1 centimeters and horizontal length of 99.2 centimeters
Collection Place: Shanghai Museum
Bamboo in Snow was created by Xu Xi,a painter in the Nantang Kingdom during the Five Dynasties. Snowy scene of south region of the Yangtze River is shown by this artwork. Whole painting features bleak, desolate and chilly atmosphere. Bamboo, stone and dead wood are covered by thin snow, which give the feeling of chill This artwork has multiple layers and orderly composition arrangement, which has novelty. Three bamboos behind the stone are towering. Bending bamboo and broken bamboo are on right side. Bold dead wood is on left side, dotted by sone tender and vigorous bamboos. In terms of depiction mode, line outline, light-ink stroke and setoff are combined. With ink color, this artwork is brilliant and exquisite.
Do You Know?
Paintings of the Five Dynasties
During the Five Dynasties, political turmoil and frequent wars happened. Only Xishu(in today’s Sichuan)and Nantang (in today’s south region of the Yangtze River) kept stable political situation and economicprosperity. Court painting academies were set up in Xishu and Nantang, which promoted the development of painting. So these regions boasted blooming painting undertaking. In this period, painting of fgure, painting of landscape and painting of flower and bird enjoyed golden era. In terms of painting of fower and bird, Huang Quan(Xishu) and Xu Xi(Nantang) were representative masters who won the reputation of”luxurious Huang Style and unconstrained Xu Style.”In terms of painting of fgure, Zhou Wenju and Gu Hongzhong(Nantang) were representative masters. In terms of painting of landscape, Jing Hao(from north region) and Dong Yuan (Nantang) created two painting styles,i.e.,”painting of landscape in northern style”and”painting of landscape in southern style.”
Art Master
XuXi
Xu Xi was a painter in the Southern Tang Dynasty during the Five Dynasties. With unknown birth date and death date, he was a native of Jinling (Nanjing), Jiangsu. As a noble, he was unwilling to secure an offcial position. He enjoyed painting in the wilderness. He liked painting natural world. His artworks have rural feeling and emphasize ink application, which have great impact on traditional Chinese painting of fower and bird in following generations.
Stone is not out lined but highlighted with setoff method.Light-ink strokes are applied to show structure and texture on the side of stone.White stone reveals the capped snowonit.Tender bamboosare distributed behind the stone with charm and moving posture.
Bending section(rather than bending bamboo pole) is a spotlight of bamboo. And bamboo branches grow from bamboo sections. Light-ink strokes are applied to show bamboo sections. Bamboo leaves are outlined with thin strokes, and background is set off with ink so as to highlight snow-capped bamboo with dark background. Bamboo poles are dotted properly and boldly. Bamboo leaves are dense and sparse in order with different sizes.
Much snow covers onupper part of bamboo Few snow covers on lower part of bamboo section.
Bamboo branches grow— from bamboo sections.
Thin snow is capped on stonce.
Tender bamboos are dotte among big bamboos, stont Dead bamboo.
thin snow. bamboos are doted with natural fun.
GeneralKnowledge
Vertical scroll
Vertical scroll refers to vertical painting with larger vertical length and smaller horizontal length.
After mounting, scrollhead and scroll pole can be installed. Vertical scroll can be hung. Such type of the traditional Chinese painting is called as”vertical scroll”and”hanging scroll.”
Brief Background
Setoff
Setoff method refers to a method for colorating objectsin the painting so as to give prominence to such objects.
