Listening to the Pines in a Riverside Pavilion

Hsiang Yuan-Pien (1525-1590) [1]

To 1916
Pang Yuanji (1864-1949), Shanghai [2]

From 1916 to 1970
Eugene Meyer (1875-1959) and Agnes E. Meyer (1887-1970), New York, NY, Washington, DC, and Mt. Kisco, NY, purchased from Pang Yuanji in 1916 [3]

From 1970
Freer Gallery of Art, bequeathed by Agnes E. Meyer in 1970 [4]

Notes:

[1] The Ming collector’s, Hsiang Yuan-pien’s seal is located on the painting, see Eugene and Agnes E. Meyer Memorial Exhibition (Washington: Freer Gallery of Art, Smithsonian Institution, 1973), p. 56, no. 25 (ill.).

[2] The painting was published and illustrated in Pang Yuanji’s catalogue, Antique Famous Chinese Paintings Collected by P’ang Lai Ch’en (Tang Wudai Song Yuan minghua), vol. 1 (Shanghai, Privately published by Pang Yuanji, 1916), no. 20: “Hsü Toa Ning, Listening to the Pines at the Hermitage.” Pang Yuanji’s collector seal is located on the painting.

[3] In 1916 Pang Yuanji, with the assistance of dealers Pang Zanchen and Seaouke Yue, sent a group of paintings illustrated in Antique Famous Chinese Paintings Collected by P’ang Lai Ch’en catalogue to New York where they were shown to Charles Freer. See Ingrid Larsen, “‘Don’t Send Ming or Later Pictures’: Charles Lang Freer and the First Major Collection of Chinese Painting in an American Museum,” Ars Orientalis vol. 40 (2011), p. 23. Freer made a selection of twenty one paintings for his collection and advised the Meyers and Louisine Havemeyer with their acquisitions. Freer’s copy of the 1916 Pang catalogue includes pencil annotations indicating that this painting was purchased by Agnes E. Meyer.

[4] The painting is included in a codicil to Agnes E. Meyer’s will and testament, dated December 23, 1969, copy in object file