Reading by the Window near a Pine Tree
Feng Zikai developed an abbreviated, almost cartoonish style of painting in response to calls by intellectuals for a twentieth-century Chinese art that could be understood by common people. Here, he renders a classic theme from Chinese landscape painting—a reading scholar in a mountain pavilion—in his new manner, merging conventions of the past with the needs of his own day. The poem reads:
The leisurely white clouds come and go often.
Don’t mind if I never welcome you in or see you out.
Zikai
--Translation by Keita Itoh and Lawrence Wu
The leisurely white clouds come and go often.
Don’t mind if I never welcome you in or see you out.
Zikai
--Translation by Keita Itoh and Lawrence Wu
Artwork Details
- Title: Reading by the Window near a Pine Tree
- Artist: Feng Zikai (Chinese, 1898–1975)
- Date: undated
- Culture: China
- Medium: Framed hanging scroll; ink and color on paper
- Dimensions: Image: 19 × 13 in. (48.3 × 33 cm)
- Classification: Paintings
- Credit Line: Bequest of Robert Hatfield Ellsworth, 2014
- Object Number: 2019.290.11
- Curatorial Department: Asian Art
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Feng Zikai
20th century
Feng Zikai
20th century
Feng Zikai
20th century
Feng Zikai
ca. 1947
Feng Zikai
1945
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