Detail View: National Palace English: Gazing at a Waterfall

Work ID: 
M01E00192
Title: 
Gazing at a Waterfall
Creation Date: 
Song Dynasty
Start Year Date: 
A.D.960
End Year Date: 
A.D.1279
Dynasty: 
39 Song Dynasty (A.D. 960~1279)
Creator: 
Xia Gui
Creation Place: 
China
Measurements: 
24.7 x 25.7 cm
Material: 
Ink and color on silk
Form: 
Ce-ye (album leaf)
Type: 
Painting
Subject: 
Landscape
Repository: 
The National Palace Museum, Taipei
Description: 
On the riverbank two pine trees stand erect and from their tall branches creeping vines hang down. Below, between shorter green plants and edged with rocks, a twisting, grassy path connects across a stream to a tile-roofed pavilion. With the pavilion's four sides open to view, we can see columns and railings painted in the ruled-line method. Two figures have stopped to sit awhile. One stretches an arm to point at the thin-as-silk waterfall in the distance and turns his head to chat with his companion. Behind and to the left of the pavilion, a pine tree grows at a slant, its trunk and branches bending and turning, at times concealing the tree in front of it. Near the riverside pavilion, there is a single boat. Deep in the distance an island gradually disappears. Behind the pavilion grows a large grove of bamboo, which is separated from the distant mountains by an open space. In the midst of the fog covering these mountains, we see only the mountain crest rising and falling. Following the mountain contours, distant trees occasionally embellish the crests of the alternating high and low peaks. Details of the painting are drawn attentively, and the artist has made use of corresponding opposites such as presence and absence, denseness and spaciousness, distance and closeness, open and closed, to create distinctions in the layers of the compositional space. At the painting's right, there is a signature of Xia Gui.
ImageV ID: 
M01E00192AS001
Rights: 
Lee & Lee Communications