Bidding Farewell to Zhang Weimao

Object Details

• Artist

  Copy after Shen Zhou 沈周 (1427-1509)

• Description

  Three men standing on the shore are shown bowing farewell to a man departing by boat. Attendants and horses stand nearby, waiting to return to town. An empty pavilion on the shore was the scene of their farewell party.

• Marks

  Two seals, "Ch'i-nan" and "Shih-t'ien" accompany the inscription.

  Two seals, "Ch'i-nan" and "Shih-t'ien" accompany the inscription.

• Inscriptions

  The artist's inscription gives an account of the situation alluded to in the painting. A friend named Chang Wei-mao received a government appointment so his colleagues gave him a farewell party and wrote poems for him. Then he asked Shen Chou to paint a picture to accompany the poems. The inscription is dated in the tenth month of the year keng-yin (1470) and is accompanied by two seals.

  Mounted after the painting on separate paper are the poems by Chang Wei-mao's friends. (In contrast to the painting, these may be genuine rather than copies.) The authors of the poems mounted after the painting are as follows:

  1. An Chih-t'ang (unidentified).

  2. Kuan Yen-chih of Yun-chien (unidentified).

  3. Ch'en Shu of K'u-su (Soochow) (unidentified).

  4. Yu Ying of Chin-hua (unidentified).

  The rest are later colophons:

  5. Wu Min-te of Wu-chin (unidentified), dated 1483.

  6. Anonymous--draft notes concerning the scroll (not intended to be mounted as a colophon).

• Collection

  Freer Gallery of Art Collection

• Origin

  China

• Credit Line

  Purchase — Charles Lang Freer Endowment

• Type

  Painting

• Restrictions and Rights

  Usage Conditions Apply

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Keep Exploring

• Related Resources

  collections.si.edu

• Date

  1500s, 1640s

• Name

  Shen, Zhou

• Place

  China

• Topic

  Boats and boating, Art, Copy, Chinese Art, Men, Ming dynasty (1368 - 1644)

• Culture

  Chinese

• Object Type

  Paintings