Couplet in running script

Object Details

• Artist

  Lu Yanshao (China, 1909-1993)

• Label

  As shadows fall through the sparse pines, the empty altar is still,

  Spring is fragrant in the slender grass, the little cave lies hidden.

  Lu Yanshao is widely recognized as one of the most important and original landscape painters of the later twentieth century, but although he was a dedicated practitioner throughout his life, his calligraphy is far less well-known, being seldom exhibited and rarely published. As a calligrapher, Lu worked in a wide range of styles and formats over his long career, most importantly the standard script found on stone inscriptions of the Northern Wei dynasty (386-535), but always returned to the model-letters tradition of his early training, as seen in this fine example of his running script. Characterized by a sense of fluid spontaneity, Lu Yanshao's writing is confidently executed and supremely cultivated. He often selected his subject matter from earlier Chinese literature, such as the two lines of this couplet, which are quoted from a poem by the Tang dynasty poet Han Hong (active 750s-780s), titled Inscribed on the Temple of the Wandering Immortal.

  Lu Yanshao was born in Jiading, Jiangsu Province, where his father ran a rice shop. In 1922 he moved to the nearby city of Shanghai and began to study painting, calligraphy, and seal carving. When the War of Resistance against Japan broke out in 1937, Lu made his way to the wartime capital in Chongqing, Sichuan Province, where he continued to paint and exhibit his works. After the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949, Lu moved to Shanghai, where he became a teacher, but in 1958 he was denounced during the "anti-rightist" campaign and lived under a cloud for twenty years until being fully rehabilitated in 1978. The following year, Lu Yanshao was made a professor at the Zhejiang Institute of Fine Arts in Hangzhou, and resumed openly teaching and painting until his death.

• Provenance

  To 1997

  Robert Hatfield Ellsworth (born 1929), New York City, to 1997

  From 1997

  Freer 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 more than ten years ago in Mr. Ellsworth's Later Chinese Painting and Calligraphy: 1800-1950 vol. 3 (New York: Random House, 1986) (see Curatorial Note 3, 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

  collections.si.edu

• Date

  1980s

• Name

  Ellsworth, Robert Hatfield

• Place

  China

• Topic

  Contemporary Art, Art, Couplet, Chinese Art, Robert Hatfield Ellsworth collection, Modern period (1912 - present), Running script

• Culture

  Chinese

• Object Type

  Calligraphy (visual works)