Plaintext Zhengming Xiyuan Poetry

Author: Editorial Board of Selected Calligraphies from Historical Stele and Stone Inscriptions
Publisher:
Publication Date: 1998-01-01
Features: Wen Zhengming (1470–1559), originally named Bi, styled Zhengzhong, and styled Hengshan, was a native of Changzhou (Suzhou), Jiangsu. He was a renowned painter and calligrapher of the mid-Ming Dynasty. Together with Shen Zhou, Tang Yin, and Qiu Ying, he was known as the "Four Masters of Wumen." He was also ranked among the "Four Talented Scholars of Jiangnan" alongside Tang Bohu, Zhu Zhishan, and Xu Zhenqing. In his later years, he matched his teacher Shen Zhou and became the leader of the Wumen School after Shen Zhou. From the Zhengde to the Jiajing eras, according to the book Wumen Huaji (History of Wumen Painters), there were a total of 876 painters of the Wumen School, a pool of talented individuals. However, at that time, only a few, such as Shen Zhou and Wen Zhengming, stood out and gained fame. Poems of the Western Garden was written by Wen Zhengming when he was fifty-six and serving as a court painter in the Hanlin Academy in Beijing. The collection consists of ten seven-character regulated verse poems describing the scenery of the imperial garden west of the palace city, centered around the Taiye Lake (now Zhongnanhai and Beihai). This scroll was written on June 10, Jiaqi (1554), thirty years after the poems were composed, when he was already eighty-five years old. The original scroll is on Buddhist scripture paper with a black silk border, measuring 28.4 cm in height and 44.74 cm in width. The running script in this scroll is vigorous and fluid, with a neat and elegant style, making it one of Wen Zhengming's late masterpieces. The back of the scroll bears inscriptions by Wang Shu and multiple seals, including the "Qing Mansion Appreciation of Calligraphy and Painting Seal."