Poem in running script
Terms of Use
Usage Conditions ApplyAt A Glance
-
Period
early to mid-19th century -
Geography
China -
Material
Hanging scroll; ink on gold-flecked paper -
Dimension
H x W (image): 164.5 x 40.7 cm (64 3/4 x 16 in) -
Accession Number
F1997.52 -
EDAN ID
edanmdm:fsg_F1997.52
Object Details
-
Artist
Ruan Yuan (1764-1849) -
Label
Picture stones from Taihang look like crowding clouds,Human craft cannot achieve the majesty of Heaven's art.The flower-and-stone convoys ended and Bian River froze,Snow Wave Studio was destroyed, winter clouds grew dark.Master Su is long departed and his stone is gone as well,The inscription that still remains in a desolate town.Along Black Water in Liangzhou, a jade axe drew the line,And the sovereign kingdom of Dali opened its national gates.Sun Zhiwei has been dead now for eight hundred years,But into the Diancang Mountains his soul was summoned back.The painter's powdered drawing entered the bones of the rock,The spiritual force of the poet penetrated the roots of Heaven.Breakers soaring up to Heaven copied the whiteness of clouds,Ancient snows immured in earth transformed to scars of jade.On slice after slice, the waves of Erhai magically appeared,That single billow from Dingzhou was not the final say.Moreover these toppling waves crashing on the quay,Stand in a screen and do not use Su Shi's level basin.The plum blossoms before my studio seem like fragrant snow,One glance at Master Snow, and the Way is there before me.An exceptionally erudite scholar, Ruan Yuan was one of the most important and influential figures in the cultural and intellectual milieu of early nineteenth century China. Born in Yizheng, Jiangsu Province, a large town on the lower Yangtze River near the city of Yangzhou, Ruan Yuan passed the national examinations in 1789 and pursued a highly successful official career. After 1799, he was governor of several provinces, including Yunnan (1826-35), where he was able to pursue his passion for collecting marble "picture stones" from the area of Dali, the main subject of the above poem. Ruan Yuan composed his poem to follow the same rhyme scheme as an earlier verse, the Snow Wave Stone, by the famous Song dynasty poet Su Shi (1037-1101), who also wrote a prose inscription on the subject. Su's poem and inscription were both quite well-known in Ruan Yuan's day, especially among stone fanciers such as Ruan, and their imagery, diction, and content underlie various lines in his poem.Ruan Yuan's contributions to the study of ancient script are particularly notable and he wrote two important theoretical essays on the evolution of calligraphic scripts and styles, dividing their historical development into northern and southern schools, each with a distinct lineage of successive masters. Closely reflecting these scholarly interests, Ruan Yuan himself wrote in various styles of seal script, clerical script, and standard script, but most frequently encountered are his works in running script, as seen in this scroll, which fall squarely within the model-letters tradition favored by the court. Reflecting more of a scholarly than artistic sense of style, this scroll is an excellent example of Ruan's limber, if somewhat conventional, approach. -
Provenance
To 1997Robert Hatfield Ellsworth (born 1929), New York City, to 1997From 1997Freer Gallery of Art, given by Robert Hatfield Ellsworth in 1997 [1]Notes:[1] The total gift from the Ellsworth collection consists of nearly three-hundred objects (F1997.42-.85 and F1998.83-294).All Chinese calligraphy in the proposed gift were published in Mr. Ellsworth's Later Chinese Painting and Calligraphy: 1800-1950 vol. 3 (New York: Random House, 1986) (see Curatorial Note 2, Joseph Chang and Stephen D. Allee, May 19, 1998, in the object record). -
Collection
Freer Gallery of Art Collection -
Exhibition History
Brushing the Past: Later Chinese Calligraphy from the Gift of Robert Hatfield Ellsworth (April 30, 2000 to January 2, 2001) -
Previous custodian or owner
Robert Hatfield Ellsworth (1929-2014) -
Origin
China -
Credit Line
Gift of Robert Hatfield Ellsworth in honor of the 75th Anniversary of the Freer Gallery of Art -
Type
Calligraphy -
Restrictions and Rights
Usage Conditions Apply
There are restrictions for re-using this media. For more information, visit the Smithsonian's Terms of Use page.
The information presented on this website may be revised and updated at any time as ongoing research progresses or as otherwise warranted. Pending any such revisions and updates, information on this site may be incomplete or inaccurate or may contain typographical errors. Neither the Smithsonian nor its regents, officers, employees, or agents make any representations about the accuracy, reliability, completeness, or timeliness of the information on the site. Use this site and the information provided on it subject to your own judgment. The National Museum of Asian Art welcomes information that would augment or clarify the ownership history of objects in their collections.
Keep Exploring
-
Related Resources
-
Date
-
Name
-
Place
-
Topic
-
Culture
-
Object Type