Xia Gui (夏圭) was a Chinese landscape painter of the Song dynasty, active around 1195-1224 according to the reference dates available. Very little is known about his life, and only a handful of his works survive, yet he is regarded as one of China's great artists. His importance lies in pushing the simplification of the Song style further and in founding, together with Ma Yuan, the Ma-Xia school, one of the most influential of its day.
Nothing is recorded about his birth, origins or training. He most likely was born in Hangzhou, then the capital, and probably worked at the Imperial Painting Academy under Emperor Ningzong, as other leading artists of the period did. His teachers are unknown, but his works show a strong debt to Li Tang, whose style shaped nearly every landscape painter of the twelfth century. His early compositions follow that language, with limited materials and a more immediate effect; over time he developed a personal manner.
Most of what survives consists of album leaves, the favourite format of academy painters. Two ink-on-silk leaves in the Tokyo National Museum show his balanced diagonal compositions, in which void and solid mass carry equal weight. His handscrolls are more striking, though very few remain. The best known, Pure and Remote View of Streams and Mountains, measures about nine metres but lacks its final section, which carried the artist's signature. Gradual washes of ink and overlapping brushstrokes create an atmosphere of mist, sky and seemingly endless space.
His reputation declined after his death, as did that of the southern Song academic painters, and it was not reassessed until the twentieth century. Even so, Sesshū Tōyō, who visited China in the fifteenth century, was influenced by his work, and Japanese followers imitated his style for centuries, until the early seventeenth century.
Works (2)
This painting by Xia Gui takes its name from the long course of the Yangtze River. Over eleven meters long but barely twenty-seven centimeters high, its elongated format means it must be unrolled section by section, so the landscape unfolds as the eye moves along it. Rather than a single scene, the work suggests a journey, though its exact intentions cannot be determined with certainty from the available information.
Where to see the work
- National Palace Museum Taipei · 2
Curiosities
A lost handscroll
His scroll Myriad Miles of the Yangtze River survives only in an unreliable sixteenth-century copy, so the original is lost to us. That copy is the only direct reference to the work and gives a limited idea of its composition. Many scholars believe the loss of so many scrolls has made it very difficult to assess his career fully.
Worn brushes
Some sources note that the painter preferred brushes with worn tips to avoid excessive softness in the stroke. According to these references, "open" brushes allowed him to make two or more strokes at the same time. It is a technical detail that helps explain the speed and looseness attributed to his work.