Masterpiece: Along the River during the Qingming Festiva

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Along the River during the Qingming Festival is generally regarded as one of the most outstanding paintings in China’s painting history, epitomizing the great achievements in traditional painting in terms of skill and art, and is still displayed to the world on various important occasions today. It was drawn by Northern Song imperial court painter Zhang Zeduan(1085-1145). Along the River During the Qingming Festival is a light-colored silk painting 24.8 centimeters wide and 528.7 centimeters long, now collected by the Palace Museum in Beijing. This painting depicts the prosperous scene and natural sight in the Northern Song Dynasty’s capital Bianliang on the Qingming Festival. The work in the form of a long scroll adopts the cavalier perspective as the composition method, including the complex scene into apicture full of changes. There are more than 500 figures in different clothes with different facial expressions. Various activities are intermingled. The painter gave emphasis to the sense of drama as well as changes in rhythm and rhyme, composed the picture proportionately, and composed the picture artfully Along the River during the Qingming Festival can be appreciated and understood in three parts

The first part is the spring scenery in the countryside near Bianliang. Thatched cottages, grass, bridges, flowing water, old trees, and small boats can be seen in al open forest, and two bearers are driving five donkeys carrying coal to the city. A willow forest turns light green, heralding the return of spring. There is a sedan chair on the road with a woman sitting inside followed by horse-riders and bearers on their way back from an outing and tomb-sweeping activity in the suburbs of the capital The top of the sedan chair is decorated with poplar and willow flowers the depiction of the environment and people makes clear the specific time and customs of the Qingming Festival as the beginning of the whole painting The middle part is the busy scene of a wharf along the bian River, which was a national hub of water transport of grain and an important commercial center in North Song Dynasty. There are a lot of people and grain boats near the bank. Some people are resting in a teahouse, some are visiting fortune-tellers, and some are dining in a restaurant. There are many ships in the river, either pulled by boat-trackers or sculled by sailors. a grand wooden arch bridge spans the Bian River. This exquisite structure beautiful in form is like a rainbow, hence the name rainbow bridge. a big boat is waiting to cross the bridge. Some sailors are hooking the bridge with long poles, some are pulling the boat with hemp ropes, and some are busy lowering the mast to facilitate its passage. People on the bridge are also stretching their necks to watch this busy scene nervously

The last part is the busy city street. The center of this part is a tall city gate tower with row upon row of buildings on both sides, including teahouses, wine shops, inns, butcher’s shops, temples, etc. The passers-by on the street jostle each other in a crowd, including all sorts of people such as merchants doing business, gentlemen watching the street view, officials on horseback, peddlers, members of influential families in sedan chairs, itinerant monks carrying back baskets, tourists from other places asking the way, and children listening to story-tellers on the street. It shows the special charm of the Song Dynasty’s capital

In the painting scroll more than 5 meters long, Zhang Zeduan depicted a total of more than 500 people more than 50 domesticated animals including cows horses nules and donkeys, more than 20 boats of different sizes, and houses, bridges and city gate towers with unique characteristics, showing the features of Song architecture. In short, Along the river during the Qingming Festival is a long genre painting scroll created with realistic methods, having very high historical value and artistic value

At the 2010 Shanghai Expo, Along the river during the Qingming Festival processed with modern science and technology shocked the world with the brand new artistic effect. This special Along the River during the Qingming Festival was actually a giant screen projection 128 meters long and 6.5 meters high, magnifying the origina painting more than 100 times. In the picture, water flows slowly, and people also are in motion What’s more spectacular is that day alternates with night, making the ancient capital Bianliang come alive