Chinese Royal Painting and Literati Painting
1 min readChinese Royal Painting
The royal painting started from the Shang and Zhou Dynasties，ended with the down of the Qing Dynasty.It refers to the works done by those professional painters employed by the royal court，or imitations of their works by other painters.This kind of painting is usually very elaborate and meticulous，sumptuous and decorative.
There is a restriction to the word“royal”，that is，if a royal painter paints outside the palace，his painting can’t be called royal painting.The famous royal paintings are the Riverside Scene at Qingming ，Bunian Tu，Wuniu Tu ，and Han Xizai Yeyan Tu .
Literati Painting
It does not parallel to figure painting，landscape painting，and flower-and-bird painting.
It generally refers to the paintings done by intellectuals and officials，who usually took painting as a kind of their spiritual sustenance，emphasizing more the scholarly execution of brush strokes and ink colors in expression than painting’s likeness to real images.
It often takes plum ，orchid ，bamboo ，chrysanthemum ，high mountain，secret fishing as the painting object to express the ideas of the painters.Plum means fighting against cold and snow；orchid means pitying oneself as a fragrant grass；bamboo means being noble in character；chrysanthemum means being glorious before insult.And high mountain and secret fishing means caring nothing about money and fame.
