Li Tang (,

courtesy name A courtesy name ( zh, s=字, p=zì, l=character), also known as a style name, is an additional name bestowed upon individuals at adulthood, complementing their given name. This tradition is prevalent in the East Asian cultural sphere, particula ...

Xigu 晞古; c. 1050 – 1130)Barnhart 1997, p. 373. was a Chinese landscape painter who practised at

Kaifeng Kaifeng ( zh, s=开封, p=Kāifēng) is a prefecture-level city in east-Zhongyuan, central Henan province, China. It is one of the Historical capitals of China, Eight Ancient Capitals of China, having been the capital eight times in history, and ...

and

Hangzhou Hangzhou, , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ; formerly romanized as Hangchow is a sub-provincial city in East China and the capital of Zhejiang province. With a population of 13 million, the municipality comprises ten districts, two counti ...

during both the

Northern Song The Song dynasty ( ) was an imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 960 to 1279. The dynasty was founded by Emperor Taizu of Song, who usurped the throne of the Later Zhou dynasty and went on to conquer the rest of the Ten Kingdoms, endin ...

and Southern Song dynasty. He forms a link between earlier painters such as Guo Xi, Fan Kuan and Li Cheng and later artists such as Xia Gui and Ma Yuan. He perfected the technique of "axe-cut" brush-strokes and his style of painting became for what is regarded as the academy-style landscape of the Southern Song.

Biography

Li Tang was born ca. 1050, a native of Heyang. Already in his early years he earned his living by painting. Sometime after 1100, under Emperor Huizong, he earned the highest rank in the Painting Academy at the court in Bianjing (now

). He survived the invasion by the Jurchen Jin dynasty in 1126–27, and, together with the court, moved to Qiantang (now

), which became the capital city of the newly established Southern Song Dynasty. He continued to serve as painter in the court under Emperor Gaozong, and died circa 1130.

Character of his art

Li was among the most influential of the early Southern Song landscape artists and had many followers. He represented a vital link between the Northern Song school ( Guo Xi, Fan Kuan, Li Cheng, and others), and the later Southern Song painters, such as Xia Gui and Ma Yuan, both of whom studied Li's art. He developed and perfected the technique of the so-called "ax-cut" brushstrokes, which gave rocks and mountains a particularly fine quality.

"Wind in Pines Among a Myriad Valleys"

As with most Song artists, few of Li Tang's paintings survive, and most are of questionable authorship. The large

hanging scroll A hanging scroll is one of the many traditional ways to display and exhibit East Asian painting and calligraphy. They are different from handscrolls, which are narrower and designed to be viewed flat on a table. Hanging scrolls are generally i ...

''Wind in Pines Among a Myriad Valleys'' (also known as ''Whispering Pines in the Mountains'';

National Palace Museum The National Palace Museum, also known as Taipei Palace Museum, is a national museum headquartered in Taipei, Taiwan. Founded in Beijing in 1925, the museum was re-established in Shilin District, Shilin, Taipei, in 1965, later expanded with a S ...

Taipei , nickname = The City of Azaleas , image_map = , map_caption = , pushpin_map = Taiwan#Asia#Pacific Ocean#Earth , coordinates = , subdivision_type = Country ...

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia. The main geography of Taiwan, island of Taiwan, also known as ''Formosa'', lies between the East China Sea, East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocea ...

) is the only painting that bears a clear signature by the artist, which is placed on one of the peaks in the top section. It reads: "Painted by Li Tang of Ho-yang in Spring of the ''chia-ch'en'' year of the Hsüan-ho Reign of the Great Song ynasty" The texture of the rocks in this painting is a standard example of the "ax-cut" strokes technique.

Other attributed works

Other works commonly attributed to Li Tang are '' Intimate Scenery of River and Mountains'', a long landscape scroll, and ''Sitting on Rocks Gazing at the Mist'', both in the possession of the National Palace Museum.

Notes

References

* Barnhart, R. M. et al. (1997). Three thousand years of Chinese painting. New Haven, Yale University Press. *Richard Edwards: ''The Landscape Art of Li T'ang''. Archives of the Chinese Art Society of America, Volume 12, 1958, pp. 48–60
JSTOR
*Richard Barnhart: ''Li T'ang (c.1050-c.1130) and the Kōtō-In Landscapes''. The Burlington Magazine, volume 114, issue 830, May 1972 (special edition for Chinese landscape painting), pp. 304–311, 313-314
JSTOR
*Dorothy Perkins: ''Encyclopedia of China: History and Culture''. Routledge, 2013, , p. 280 ()

External links

Landscapes Clear and Radiant: The Art of Wang Hui (1632-1717)
an exhibition catalog from The Metropolitan Museum of Art (fully available online as PDF), which contains material on Li Tang (see index)
Sung and Yuan paintings
an exhibition catalog from The Metropolitan Museum of Art Libraries (fully available online as PDF), which contains material on Li Tang (see list of paintings)

{{DEFAULTSORT:Li, Tang 1130 deaths 1050s births 11th-century Chinese painters 12th-century Chinese painters Painters from Henan People from Jiaozuo Song dynasty landscape painters