Wang Shishen, Plum Blossoms
Kelvin Smith, 1985.366 · The Cleveland Museum of Art, Open Access (CC0)View original →
Wang Shishen

Plum Blossoms

probably 1739

Current Collection

Cleveland Museum of Art

Cleveland, United States

Medium
Hanging scroll; ink on paper
Dimensions
238 × 89.1 cm
Status
In Museum Collection
Collect24 Art ID
C24-113522

A native of Anhui province, Wang Shishen was a professional painter who specialized in plum blossoms. He moved to Yangzhou in the late 1720s to seek patrons. Here, the daring composition of a flowering plum branch is balanced through the addition of four poems. Wang’s poems evoke nostalgia for the forgotten Six Dynasties period and the glorious Sui dynasty, during which the Grand Canal was built while Yangzhou was the southern capital of the empire. Other inscriptions in the upper part of the painting allude to the fact that Wang had developed blindness in one eye, probably at the time he con…

Provenance

Kelvin Smith, 1985.366

Registry history

  • probably 1739 — Recorded in the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art

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