Five Oxen
3 min readPainter: Han Huang
Painting Year: the Tang Dynasty
Material: paper scroll
Dimension: vertical length of 20.8 centimeters and
horizontal length of 139.8 centimeters
Collection Place: the Palace Museun in Beijing
The Five oxen, painted in the Tang Dynasty, is one of the best ancient Chinese paintings of aninals. It is also the earliest paper painting that has been passed down to today. In the picture the painter drew fve oxen with different postures. The five oxen were respectively, from right to left, lowering the head to eat grass, raising the head, showing the face, turning the head and wearing a bridle. These oxen had differ-ent tempers, as well as simple and lovely expressions, filling the picture with rural favors.
The fve oxen share accurate and vivid shapes. The lines are simple, unsophisticated, steady and full of changes. The colors of the picture are light and elegant, giving the furs a sense of reality, and showing the fgures and undulation of the bodies.
GeneralKnowledge
“Paper Scroll”and”Rice Paper”
The Chinese painting drawn on the paper is called”paper scroll.”There are many kinds of paper used for the Chinese painting. The paper used for Chinese calligraphy and painting is commonly called”rice paper.”The rice paper is divided into”ripe rice paper”and”raw rice paper.”The elaborate-style painting needs the ripe rice paper while the freehand brushwork needs the raw rice paper.
Art Master
Han Huang(723-787)
He was a famous painter in the Tang Dynasty. He came from Chang’ an (today’s Xi’ an, Shaanxi). He once served the court as the Prine Minister and was titled as the Duke of Jin. He was good at calligraphy and painting and particularly specialized in the creation of paintings of rural custom, oxen and sheep.
Different from the other four oxen，this ox wore a bridle.The other oxen were enjoying themselves while this one seemed a bit unhappy.
Painting animals is actually the same with painting people and it contains the emotions and ideas of people.Here the painter implied the unfair treatment in the world.
Emperor Qianlong’s Poem andFive Oxen
Five Oxen was once collected by many people in different dynasties.Among them，Emperor Qianlong once wrote a poem on the painting，which meant that an ox wearing a bridle was walking with other four oxen and Han Huang wanted to use them to show the lofty sentiment of Bing Ji，the Prime Minister in Hongjing Period of the Western Han Dynasty；the fve oxen licked or bit something and the picture was to praise Bing Ji who observed ordinary people’s sufferings by asking why the oxen were panting.
As an emperor，Qianlong always hoped for wise and good ministers to help hin to rule the country.And HanHuang once worked as the Prime Minister and thus cared much about the sufferings of peasants.Therefore，Emperor Qianlong thought Han Huang’s Five Oxen told a story in the Western Han Dynasty:the Prime Minister Bing Ji accidentally saw an ox sticking out its tongue and panting when he went out.He stopped and asked the peasant nearby for the reason.Through this he knew the conditions of the people and experienced the sufferings of them.
This is an ox showing its front face. It is hard to draw an ox from that angle. However, Han luang handled both the size and thepers pectiveaccurate1y a n d naturally with his painting skill. It was hard to achieve this without watching and studying the ox for a long time.
This ox raised its head and wore a leisurely expression. The painter moved his brush and drew the lines following the frame of the body, giving a steady, simple, regular and rhythmic configuration to this ox. The soft skin of the nether part of its neck forms a contrast with.
