Six Persimmons
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Six Persimmons
''Six Persimmons'' () is a 13th-century Chinese painting by the monk Muqi Fachang. It was painted during the Song dynasty. Muqi was one of the two great exponents of the ''spontaneous mode'' of Chinese painting (the other being Liang Kai). It features six persimmons floating on an undefined, but skillfully mottled background. It is painted in blue-black ink on paper.Lee Page 379-380 The painting became famous for the tremendous skill of the brushstrokes. Their subtlety of modeling is often remarked upon. The thick and thin brushstrokes that model the lightest of the persimmons make it seem to float in contrast to the dark one next to it. The treatment of the stems and leaves recall Chinese characters, and reveal brush control at its highest level. Professor James Cahill of the University of California Berkeley devoted an entire lecture to it, available online. {{Quotation, (Six Persimmons is) passion... congealed into a stupendous calm. , Arthur Waley, Waley page 231 It currently ...
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Mu Qi
Muqi or Muxi (; Japanese: Mokkei; 1210?–1269?), also known as Fachang (), was a Chinese Chan Buddhist monk and painter who lived in the 13th century, around the end of the Southern Song dynasty (1127–1279). Today, he is considered to be one of the greatest Chan painters in history. His ink paintings, such as the Daitokuji triptych and ''Six Persimmons'' are regarded as essential Chan paintings. Muqi's style of painting has also profoundly impacted painters from later periods to follow, especially monk painters in Japan. According to Chinese secondary sources, Muqi's surname was thought to be Li. "Muqi" was his art name, and "Fachang" was, in fact, his formal name in the monastery system. Biography Muqi was born in the early 13th century, approximately around 1200–1210, toward the end of Southern Song Dynasty in China. According to Dr. Aaron Rio, specific life details of Muqi are commonly unknown. However, the scholar stated that Muqi was initially from Sichuan, China. T ...
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Kyoto, Japan
Kyoto (; Japanese: , ''Kyōto'' ), officially , is the capital city of Kyoto Prefecture in Japan. Located in the Kansai region on the island of Honshu, Kyoto forms a part of the Keihanshin metropolitan area along with Osaka and Kobe. , the city had a population of 1.46 million. The city is the cultural anchor of a substantially larger metropolitan area known as Greater Kyoto, a metropolitan statistical area (MSA) home to a census-estimated 3.8 million people. Kyoto is one of the oldest municipalities in Japan, having been chosen in 794 as the new seat of Japan's imperial court by Emperor Kanmu. The original city, named Heian-kyō, was arranged in accordance with traditional Chinese feng shui following the model of the ancient Chinese capital of Chang'an/Luoyang. The emperors of Japan ruled from Kyoto in the following eleven centuries until 1869. It was the scene of several key events of the Muromachi period, Sengoku period, and the Boshin War, such as the Ōnin War, the Honn ...
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Daitoku-ji
is a Buddhist temple, one of fourteen autonomous branches of the Rinzai school of Japanese Zen. It is located in Kita-ku, Kyoto, Japan. The "mountain name" ('' sangō'') by which it is known is . The Daitoku-ji temple complex today covers more than . History Daitoku-ji originated as a small monastery founded in 1315 or 1319 by the monk , who is known by the title ''Daitō Kokushi'' ("National Teacher of the Great Lamp") given by Emperor Go-Daigo. In 1325, the monastery was converted into a supplication hall for the imperial court at the request of the retired Emperor Hanazono. The dedication ceremony for the imperial supplication hall, with its newly added dharma hall and abbot's living quarters, was held in 1326, and this is generally recognized as the true founding of the temple.Kodansha Encyclopedia of Japan, entry "Daitokuji." Like many other temples in Kyoto during that time, the temple's buildings were destroyed by fire. In 1474, which was when Kyoto was the scene of the ...
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Chinese Painting
Chinese painting () is one of the oldest continuous artistic traditions in the world. Painting in the traditional style is known today in Chinese as ''guó huà'' (), meaning "national painting" or "native painting", as opposed to Western styles of art which became popular in China in the 20th century. It is also called ''danqing'' (). Traditional painting involves essentially the same techniques as calligraphy and is done with a brush dipped in black ink or coloured pigments; oils are not used. As with calligraphy, the most popular materials on which paintings are made are paper and silk. The finished work can be mounted on scrolls, such as hanging scrolls or handscrolls. Traditional painting can also be done on album sheets, walls, lacquerware, folding screens, and other media. The two main techniques in Chinese painting are: * Gongbi (工筆), meaning "meticulous", uses highly detailed brushstrokes that delimit details very precisely. It is often highly colored and usual ...
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Muqi Fachang
Muqi or Muxi (; Japanese: Mokkei; 1210?–1269?), also known as Fachang (), was a Chinese Chan Buddhist monk and painter who lived in the 13th century, around the end of the Southern Song dynasty (1127–1279). Today, he is considered to be one of the greatest Chan painters in history. His ink paintings, such as the Daitokuji triptych and '' Six Persimmons'' are regarded as essential Chan paintings. Muqi's style of painting has also profoundly impacted painters from later periods to follow, especially monk painters in Japan. According to Chinese secondary sources, Muqi's surname was thought to be Li. "Muqi" was his art name, and "Fachang" was, in fact, his formal name in the monastery system. Biography Muqi was born in the early 13th century, approximately around 1200–1210, toward the end of Southern Song Dynasty in China. According to Dr. Aaron Rio, specific life details of Muqi are commonly unknown. However, the scholar stated that Muqi was initially from Sichuan, China. ...
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Song Dynasty
The Song dynasty (; ; 960–1279) was an imperial dynasty of China that began in 960 and lasted until 1279. The dynasty was founded by Emperor Taizu of Song following his usurpation of the throne of the Later Zhou. The Song conquered the rest of the Ten Kingdoms, ending the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period. The Song often came into conflict with the contemporaneous Liao, Western Xia and Jin dynasties in northern China. After retreating to southern China, the Song was eventually conquered by the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty. The dynasty is divided into two periods: Northern Song and Southern Song. During the Northern Song (; 960–1127), the capital was in the northern city of Bianjing (now Kaifeng) and the dynasty controlled most of what is now Eastern China. The Southern Song (; 1127–1279) refers to the period after the Song lost control of its northern half to the Jurchen-led Jin dynasty in the Jin–Song Wars. At that time, the Song court retreated south of the ...
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Liang Kai
Liang Kai (; ''c''. 1140 - ''c''. 1210) was a Chinese painter of the Southern Song Dynasty. He was also known as Madman Liang because of his very informal pictures. He was born in Shandong and worked in Lin An (later Hangzhou). He is known to have studied with the master Jia Shigu. He was awarded the rank of Painter-in-Attendance at the court of Jia Tai (1201-1204 CE, Southern Song Dynasty) where he was known for mastery in painting figures, landscapes, and other minor subjects. He was also awarded the Golden Belt, however he left it behind when he left his position at court to practise Chan Buddhism. Painting style Liang Kai is most famous for originating or developing the "Xie Yi" (sometimes translated as "sketch style") of painting, where the objective is to evoke the subject or atmosphere with minimal use of detail; it requires a profound mastery of painting technique and perfect concentration, but also allows for the beauty of accidental effects. The Xie Yi style is clos ...
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Persimmons
The persimmon is the edible fruit of a number of species of trees in the genus ''Diospyros''. The most widely cultivated of these is the Oriental persimmon, ''Diospyros kaki'' ''Diospyros'' is in the family Ebenaceae, and a number of non-persimmon species of the genus are grown for ebony timber. In 2019, China produced 75% of the world total of persimmons. Description Like the tomato, persimmons are not commonly considered to be berries, but morphologically the fruit is in fact a berry. The tree ''Diospyros kaki'' is the most widely cultivated species of persimmon. Typically the tree reaches in height and is round-topped. It usually stands erect, but sometimes can be crooked or have a willowy appearance. The leaves are long, and are oblong in shape with brown-hairy petioles in length. They are leathery and glossy on the upper surface, brown and silky underneath. The leaves are deciduous and bluish-green in color. In autumn, they turn to yellow, orange, or red. Persim ...
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Chinese Character
Chinese characters () are logograms developed for the Written Chinese, writing of Chinese. In addition, they have been adapted to write other East Asian languages, and remain a key component of the Japanese writing system where they are known as ''kanji''. Chinese characters in South Korea, which are known as ''hanja'', retain significant use in Korean academia to study its documents, history, literature and records. Vietnam once used the ''chữ Hán'' and developed chữ Nôm to write Vietnamese language, Vietnamese before turning to a Vietnamese alphabet, romanized alphabet. Chinese characters are the oldest continuously used system of writing in the world. By virtue of their widespread current use throughout East Asia and Southeast Asia, as well as their profound historic use throughout the adoption of Chinese literary culture, Sinosphere, Chinese characters are among the most widely adopted writing systems in the world by number of users. The total number of Chinese c ...
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Arthur Waley
Arthur David Waley (born Arthur David Schloss, 19 August 188927 June 1966) was an English orientalist and sinologist who achieved both popular and scholarly acclaim for his translations of Chinese and Japanese poetry. Among his honours were the CBE in 1952, the Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry in 1953, and he was invested as a Companion of Honour in 1956. Although highly learned, Waley avoided academic posts and most often wrote for a general audience. He chose not to be a specialist but to translate a wide and personal range of classical literature. Starting in the 1910s and continuing steadily almost until his death in 1966, these translations started with poetry, such as ''A Hundred and Seventy Chinese Poems'' (1918) and ''Japanese Poetry: The Uta'' (1919), then an equally wide range of novels, such as '' The Tale of Genji'' (1925–26), an 11th-century Japanese work, and ''Monkey'', from 16th-century China. Waley also presented and translated Chinese philosophy, wrote biogra ...
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Song Dynasty Paintings
A song is a musical composition intended to be performed by the human voice. This is often done at distinct and fixed pitches (melodies) using patterns of sound and silence. Songs contain various forms, such as those including the repetition and variation of sections. Written words created specifically for music, or for which music is specifically created, are called lyrics. If a pre-existing poem is set to composed music in classical music it is an art song. Songs that are sung on repeated pitches without distinct contours and patterns that rise and fall are called chants. Songs composed in a simple style that are learned informally "by ear" are often referred to as folk songs. Songs that are composed for professional singers who sell their recordings or live shows to the mass market are called popular songs. These songs, which have broad appeal, are often composed by professional songwriters, composers, and lyricists. Art songs are composed by trained classical composers fo ...
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Persimmon
The persimmon is the edible fruit of a number of species of trees in the genus ''Diospyros''. The most widely cultivated of these is the Oriental persimmon, ''Diospyros kaki'' ''Diospyros'' is in the family Ebenaceae, and a number of non-persimmon species of the genus are grown for ebony timber. In 2019, China produced 75% of the world total of persimmons. Description Like the tomato, persimmons are not commonly considered to be berries, but Morphology (biology), morphologically the fruit is in fact a berry (botany), berry. The tree ''Diospyros kaki'' is the most widely cultivated species of persimmon. Typically the tree reaches in height and is round-topped. It usually stands erect, but sometimes can be crooked or have a willowy appearance. The leaves are long, and are Glossary of leaf morphology#oblong, oblong in shape with brown-hairy Petiole (botany), petioles in length. They are leathery and glossy on the upper surface, brown and silky underneath. The leaves are dec ...
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