Page 447 - Art In The Age Of Exploration (Great Section on Chinese Art Ming Dynasty)

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Tang Yin
1470-1523

PALACE LADIES OF THE STATE OF SHU

Chinese
hanging scroll; ink and color on silk
2
124.7 x 6}.6 (49 /8 x 25 )
inscription with signature of the artist
reference: Shanghai 1922, 23: pi 8
Palace Museum, Beijing

In lotus-blossom headdresses and Daoist robes,
They daily served their sovereign and
entertained in private palace chambers:
These flowery willows don't realize that the
man has already gone,
And year after year struggle over greens and
wrangle over reds.

The last ruler of the Shu kingdom was always
in the palace with his young ladies. He ordered
the palace concubines to wear Daoist robes and
to don lotus-blossom caps, and daily sought out
"flowery willows" to serve at drinking parties.
Rumors had already spread to every ear in Shu,
but the ruler did nothing to counter them, so
in the end his frivolity brought him to ruin.
I think in retrospect of the time when people
shook their heads [in dismay] [and note that] he
then had someone to grasp his wrist [i.e., to
admonish him] . Tang Yin

Four exquisitely gowned and carefully groomed
court beauties converse in a group, their flutter-
ing hands serving as visual analogue for the music
of their high-pitched voices. Tightly unified by
their general similarity of posture and form, they
are each individually characterized by variety in
costume, position, and orientation. Distinguished
from high-born ladies of their court by their viva-
cious manner and deep decolletages, these lovely
young women were courtesans or entertainers
who served, according to the artist's inscription,
as attendants and companions at imperial drinking
parties. The inscription further identifies the
court as that of the last ruler of the Kingdom of
Shu in present-day Sichuan Province. It is telling
of the great and continuous length of Chinese
political history in which there were two king-
doms named Shu some seven hundred years
apart; the last rulers of both, as might be loved to ride and play polo but he was equally skill in figure painting as well. The delicate
expected, were noted for addiction to the plea- enamored of the Daoist sexual arts, for which he washes, subtle color combinations, and elegant,
sures of the flesh. The painting has thus been acquired an enormous imperial harem. Meng descriptive brushwork of the present painting are
published as illustrating ladies of the court either desisted from collecting girls only after being precisely those characteristics of Huang Quan's
of Liu Chan (207-267, r. 223-263) or of Meng admonished by one of his own officials. Meng's works noted by earlier critics; the lack of defining
Chang (919-965, r. 934-965). Although the court was also embellished by the creations of environment and the creation of pictorial space
expression Shu Houzhu, or "last ruler of Shu/ such artists as Huang Quan (903-968), who in solely through placement of the figures also
seems to have been associated especially with Liu 925 had been given complete charge of the court characterize paintings from the time of Huang or
Chan, it is most likely that the artist had Meng painting academy. Although Huang is known slightly earlier. In style as well as in subject the
Chang in mind when he painted the composition. today primarily as a painter of flower-and-bird painting may thus be taken as a reference to the
Like many young men of his day Meng Chang compositions, historical records attest his great tenth-century court of Meng Chang.
446 CIRCA 1492