Mount E’mei

Since Tang Dynasty, Chinese landscape paintingshavemainly developed two categories: one isthe"Blue and Green"landscapecreated by Li Sixun and his son Li Zhaodao, another is ink landscapecreated by Wu Daozi and Wang Wei. Paintings in the former category are mainly in bright colorswithsophisticated crafts, while paintings in the latter category are created in ink with light and fresh style. Since the late Ming Dynasty, Mo Shilong(1537-1587) and Dong Qichang (1555-1636)divided landscape painting styles into "Southern School" and "Northern School". Since then, “favor the Southern School while belittle the Northern" became the mainstream, and the theory of "Southern and Northern School" with strong literati values guided painting field for three hundred years, which greatly influenced later generations’ understanding of landscape painting and its history, and even affected artists practical creations. This painting created by Zhang Daqian depicts magnificent mountains of Mount E’mei in Sichuan. Zhang did not stick to one pattern, but adopted both "blue and green" color and black ink, drawing the advantages of bothgenresand blend them harmoniously into awhole.Hisvision hadtranscendedthe limitations of Ming and Qing Dynasties. The picture takes an overlooking perspective, taking in the whole E’meiMountains. The mountains are strong and thick, and the forceful style could be compared withlandscape paintings in Song Dynasty. Another eye-catching feature of the painting lies in the clouds, which are very flat and low, just like a sea of clouds surrounding the mountains, which not only fills the space and separates the picture into different levels, but also highlights the steep and grand mountains in Mount E’mei.