chinese landscape painting

created by some of China's most highly respected artists in Sichuan. These paintings clearly resemble the technique and brushstrokes exercised by ancient masters. Artists of traditional Chinese painting do not attempt to disguise the contemporary Chinese artist's interpretation of a classical subject matter, but aim to reflect the artistic accomplishment of the old master. Through the process of studying old masterpieces, our artists of traditional Chinese painting perpetuate the most important values in classical Chinese art.

Methods and Styles in Chinese Landscape Painting
In landscape art Xieyi predominates. It allows the feelings to flow, encourages the freedom of expression that makes the artist. It conveys an imagery unconstrained by reality, unlimited by the conventional view of a subject. Proportion, perspective and light are viewed as limitations and dealt with accordingly. The viewer is expected to move his eyes as he takes in the full scene, absorbing the detail from minutely different angles, using the imagination as well as other senses.

Most early Chinese painters were also poets and calligraphers, and their works included aspects of those disciplines. The Chinese see painting, poetry and calligraphy as interlinking art forms. Colophons (inscriptions) have historically been a common feature of Chinese landscape art - adding information, sentiment and decoration.


Chinese landscape painting developed two separate styles known as blue and green and ink and wash. Blue and green uses bright, primary colour pigments to create a rich and striking work that is visually attractive. Ink and wash by contrast uses dark shades right through to black, to produce an intense impression of the artist’s personal conception of his subject.

The painting itself is a product of the imagination as much as it is a representation of place. The focus is invariably on peace and tranquillity, expressed idealistically according to what the artist sees. The result can be vague to the untrained eye, but equally evokes an appreciation of something other-worldly, a temporary escape from reality.

Some Famous Chinese Landscape Artists
An early painter to introduce the styles and techniques for which Chinese landscape art would become famous was Dong Yuan (c934 – c962). His best-known work is perhaps The Xiao and Xiang Rivers.

During the Yuan Dynasty Wu Zhen (1280 – 1354) and others further developed the less realistic, more imaginative expression in the work they were doing. Wu Zhen’s The Central Mountain shows his distinctive style.