Scholar admiring plum blossoms

Scholar admiring plum blossoms

Unidentified artist

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This small landscape is a rare example of the continuation of the Southern Song Painting Academy manner during the Mongol occupation. With the establishment of the native Chinese Ming dynasty in 1368, the Song style again returned to prominence as the model for the Ming Imperial Painting Academy. This painting demonstrates that practitioners of the Song style continued to work through the fourteenth century, bridging the gap between the two formal academies. Executed in the mode of the Song master Ma Yuan (act. ca. 1190–1225), the painting continues the subject matter and vividly descriptive manner of the Song but uses more abstract outline strokes to define rocks and tree trunks, reflecting the development of a calligraphic brush style by Yuan scholar-artists. Almost no paintings of this type survive in China; all known examples come from Japan, where this style and tall narrow format had an important influence on Japanese artists of the Muromachi period (1333–1573).

Asian Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

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The Met's collection of Asian art—more than 35,000 objects, ranging in date from the third millennium B.C. to the twenty-first century—is one of the largest and most comprehensive in the world. Each of the many civilizations of Asia is represented by outstanding works, providing an unrivaled experience of the artistic traditions of nearly half the world.