明 錢榖 蘭亭修禊圖 卷|Gathering at the Orchid Pavilion

Qian Gu

1560 · Handscroll; ink and color on paper · Asian Art

In 353, the renowned calligrapher Wang Xizhi (307–365) and his friends met at the Orchid Pavilion (at Shanyin, in modern Zhejiang Province) to celebrate the spring festival of purification. Sitting by a stream, they held a poetry competition. When the time was up, eleven men had finished two poems, and fifteen had finished one; the sixteen who failed to come up with anything (among them, Wang’s son Xianzhi) were penalized by having to drink three additional cups of wine. In Qian Gu’s representation of this famous literary event, cups of wine float downstream as the poets, lined up on both sides, drink freely and struggle to complete their poems. Orphaned at an early age, Qian Gu did not receive a formal education until adulthood, when he became a pupil of Wen Zhengming (1470–1559). This painting is modeled after a composition said to have been originated by Li Gonglin (ca. 1049–1106).

Artist

Qian Gu

Date

1560

Medium

Handscroll; ink and color on paper

Culture

China

Department

Asian Art

Credit line

Ex coll.: C. C. Wang Family, Gift of Douglas Dillon, 1980