Remote Landscape with Pavilion

The painting is stated in the signature inscription on the upper left to be made by Tao Xuan for his friend Wang Dijian in the 5th year of the Zhizheng reign (1345) although the friendship between them is undocumented elsewhere. A brief account of Tao Xuan’s life is given in no other ancient source except Tuhui Baojian (Handbook on Painting) by Xia Wenyan of the Yuan that the painter, a native of Jinling, modelled his landscapes on Li Cheng, a painter active during the Five Dynasties and the Northern Song.

In this only known work by the painter, the flat-distance composition is typical of the Yuan and is commonly seen in the wastelands captured by Li Cheng from a low vantage point. In the foreground are a handful of upright trees and bamboos. The viewer’s gaze is then directed by the zigzagging river bank to the receding middle-ground and then background. Dotted and washed at their bases, the hills and rocks are shaped succinctly in ink with a relatively dry brush, bringing to mind Ni Zan among “the Four Masters of the Yuan”. When compared with Ni Zan’s Six Gentlemen (Shanghai Museum), which was also painted in 1345 and likewise replacing Li Cheng’s desolate wilderness with a beguiling waterscape, the present specimen does not bear any noticeable borrowings while Dong Yuan’s hemp-fibre texture strokes are quite conspicuous in Ni’s painting.

To the right of the signature inscription are observations about Tao Xuan and the recipient Wang Dijian inscribed by Gao Shiqi of the Qing. Wang Dijian, who was on the cusp between the Southern Song and Yuan dynasties, is said to be a poet. Dai Biaoyuan of the Yuan recorded that Wang Dijian lived in seclusion in the middle of a vast and uninhabited plain to the south of Mount Ji which offered an unobstructed panorama of the surrounding area. The scene described coincides with that in the present painting.

Subjugated by alien people, the literati left over from the Song dynasty were barred from or disinclined to join the new regime and chose to lead a reclusive life instead, leading to the proliferation of paintings and literary works celebrating this way of living. In this regard, the specimen before us is definitely an example.