清 趙之謙 芍藥 扇面|Peony

Zhao Zhiqian

dated 1862 · Folding fan mounted as an album leaf; ink and color on gold-flecked paper · Asian Art

Zhao Zhiqian focused his commitment to calligraphic brushwork upon the genre of flower painting. Such images, with their sumptuous colors and symbolic associations with beauty, prosperity, and good fortune, appealed to the tastes of the new urban consumer. Zhao often painted on folding fans, a format popular during the later Ming and Qing dynasties, when fans became fashionable accoutrements for gentlemen. Peony, an image that connotes material prosperity and good fortune, introduces the boldness and simplicity of seal carving and early stone-carved scripts to painting. The forms of the blossom, leaves, and stem are artfully integrated with the curving shape of the fan.

Artist

Zhao Zhiqian

Date

dated 1862

Medium

Folding fan mounted as an album leaf; ink and color on gold-flecked paper

Culture

China

Department

Asian Art

Credit line

Gift of Robert Hatfield Ellsworth, in memory of La Ferne Hatfield Ellsworth, 1986