Joint calligraphy
Huang Daozhou Chinese
Ni Yuanlu Chinese
Not on view
This scroll is a testament to the early friendship and mutual admiration of the two men, both of whom earned their "presented scholar" (jinshi) degrees in 1622 and went on to become outspoken exponents of political reform. It opens with a playful description by Huang of the similarities between the two friends' calligraphy. He states that he did not arrive at a style of his own until he studied Ni's writing, but he also recounts how Ni had made the same claim about Huang's influence on his calligraphy. Huang ends by remarking that after Ni became a high official, it was nearly impossible to obtain a piece of calligraphy from him. Ni Yuanlu's response, appended to the same length of satin, takes an equally sarcastic tone. Both men's calligraphic styles derive from orthodox models but have an emphatic angularity—with sharp, "side-tip" strokes made by holding the brush obliquely—that is said to reflect their forceful personalities.
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