Bada Shanren

File:个山小像（局部）.jpg

Portrait of Bada Shanren, 1674, ink on paper, Badashanren Memorial Hall.

Zhu Da ({{#invoke:Lang|lang}}), also known by his pen name Bada Shanren ({{#invoke:Lang|lang}}), was a late-Ming and early-Qing dynasty Chinese painter, calligrapher, and poet. He was born in Nanchang, Jiangxi, in 1626, at during the Ming-Qing Transition.<ref name=":0">Template:Cite book</ref> Zhu was mentally ill and displayed erratic behavior.<ref name=":23" /> He was related to the House of Zhu, which was destroyed and executed by the new Qing dynasty. Fearing that he would also be purged and executed, he fled to a Buddhist temple and learned the teachings of Chan (Zen) Buddhism, becoming a monk for 30 years.<ref name=":3" />

He spent most of his early to mid-life in the Buddhist monkhood, returning to Nanchang when he was about fifty years old.<ref>Wang and Barnhart, 14, 50.</ref> He embarked on an artistic career soon after reentering secular life in 1680, producing works that featured his calligraphy, painting, and poetry.<ref name=":1">Wang and Barnhart, 50.</ref> Most of the time, he painted simple subjects like flowers, plants, and animals and kept most of the given space empty.<ref name=":1" /> Toward the end of his life, he started painting more landscapes.<ref name=":2">Wang and Barnhart, 70.</ref><ref>Template:Cite journal</ref>

Some of his artwork were metaphors on the fall of the Ming dynasty and its failure after being destroyed by the Qing.<ref name=":16" /> His poems often included obscure references.<ref name=":14" />

Background

Bada Shanren lived during a tumultuous time in China, witnessing the Qing dynasty's conquest of the Ming dynasty and execution of the House of Zhu.<ref name=":3">Template:Cite journal</ref> In the early 1600s, around the time Bada was born, the Ming government was disintegrating from factional conflict and rebellion.<ref name=":4">Tynon, “Painting and Politics,” 101.</ref> Facing a rebellion led by Li Zicheng in 1644, the last Ming emperor committed suicide. Wu Sangui asked for help from the Qing dynasty to crush Li Zicheng's rebellion.<ref name=":4" /> The Qing then proceeded to seize Beijing, the imperial capital, and overthrew the Ming dynasty.<ref name=":0" />

The Qing also defeated Ming loyalists, known as yimin.<ref name=":4" /> Zhu Youlang, the Prince of Gui, was crowned the Yongli emperor of the shortlived Southern Ming dynasty in 1647, centered around Yunnan with Kunming as its capital.<ref name=":4" /> In 1662, the Qing dynasty and Wu Sangui executed Zhu by strangling.<ref name=":0" /> Wu took control over Yunnan and established the short-lived Zhou dynasty.<ref name=":4" /> In 1673, Wu led the Revolt of the Three Feudatories against the new Qing government, but failed.<ref name=":0" /> The Qing successfully suppressed the rebellion in 1681.<ref name=":0" />

Biography

Early life and family

A descendant of a Ming imperial prince, Bada was born into a family of accomplished scholars and artists.<ref name=":5">Mina Kim, “Lotus and Birds in the Cincinnati Art Museum: Philosophical Syncretism in the Transitional Work of Bada Shanren” (The Ohio State University, 2012), 6.</ref> His grandfather Zhu Duozheng was a poet, painter, calligrapher, and seal-carver, and his father was most likely Zhu Moujin, a painter and calligrapher mute since birth.<ref>Wang and Barnhart, Master of the Lotus Garden, 6, 13.</ref> Bada grew up under such artistic influences, studying poetry, calligraphy, and painting through his family's works.<ref name="Wang and Barnhart, 23">Wang and Barnhart, 23.</ref> Bada also received a classical education and passed the first-level test of the civil service examinations in the early 1640s.<ref>Kim, “Lotus and Birds,” 6.</ref> He married his first wife in his late teens, with whom he had at least one child.<ref name=":1" />

Monastic life

After the Qing dynasty takeover of China, Bada fled to a Buddhist temple west of Nanchang, fearing for his safety given his connection to the House of Zhu, the Ming imperial family. The Qing dynasty had purged and executed Zhu Youlang and many other members of the Zhu family that ruled over the Ming.<ref name=":3" /> In 1645, he joined the monastic order at the age of nineteen.<ref name=":3" /> He spent about thirty years in the monkhood, studying the teachings of Chan Buddhism and the styles of past masters of calligraphy and painting.<ref name=":6">Wang and Barnhart, Master of the Lotus Garden, 14.</ref>

Later life

Around 1680, Bada left the priesthood and refashioned himself as a professional painter and poet.<ref name=":1" /> He was dissatisfied with his monastic life all throughout the 1670s, during which he sought relationships outside the monastic order.<ref name=":6" /><ref>Kim, “Lotus and Birds,” 7.</ref> He met the poet Qiu Lian and Qiu's father-in-law Hu Yitang in the early 1670s.<ref>Wang and Barnhart, Master of the Lotus Garden, 38.</ref> Despite his abandonment of priestly duties, Bada was still influenced by Buddhist teachings and remained close friends with several Buddhist monks.<ref name=":7">Wang and Barnhart, 57.</ref>

The Portrait of Geshan, painted in 1674, reflects Bada's refashioning from a monk to scholarly artist.<ref name=":8">Wang and Barnhart, 40.</ref> According to Wang Fangyu, a scholar and collector of Bada Shanren's work, the straw hat and loose, long robes make Bada look more like a scholar than a monk.<ref name=":8" />

Bada also remarried soon after returning to Nanchang in 1680 but within a few years became single, dissatisfied with the marriage.<ref name=":1" /> For a while, his paintings reflected his unhappiness from the failed marriage.<ref name=":1" /> During this time, Bada also showed signs of eccentric behavior.<ref name=":23">Kim, “Lotus and Birds,” 20.</ref> Many believed he was feigning madness to eschew political involvement.<ref>Tynon, “Painting and Politics,” 107.</ref> From 1684 onward, Bada mostly stayed put in Nanchang, devoting himself to painting and calligraphy, and in the mid-1690s built a painting studio. With his scanty earnings, he lived in a small residential quarter in the southern part of Nanchang.<ref>Wang and Barnhart, Master of the Lotus Garden, 57.</ref>

Artistic pursuits

Calligraphy

Bada's family members, including his grandfather and father, were calligraphers, whose works Bada studied from a young age.<ref name="Wang and Barnhart, 23"/> During his early years in the monastery, Bada practiced calligraphy by studying the works of Tang and Song calligraphers.<ref>Kim, "Lotus and Birds," 9.</ref> Not yet settled on a style, Bada employed a wide range of script types, including the standard script kaishu, fully cursive script caoshu, and semicursive script xingshu.<ref>Wang and Barnhart, Master of the Lotus Garden, 46–47.</ref> His standard scripts were modelled on the precisely executed kaishu script of Tang calligrapher Ouyang Xun.<ref>Wang and Barnhart, 47.</ref> In his cursive and semicursive scripts, Bada emulated the swift and fluid brushstrokes of Ming calligrapher Dong Qichang, achieving the flying white calligraphic effect.<ref name=":9">Wang and Barnhart, 48.</ref> Toward the end of his priesthood, Bada began to explore the exaggerated cursive script of Song calligrapher Huang Tingjian.<ref name=":9" />

After leaving the monastery, Bada continued to study the Song calligrapher's writing, for instance copying his essay titled “Praising the Virtue of Wine.”<ref name=":10">Wang and Barnhart, 55.</ref> He rendered it in a style not identical to Huang Tingjian's but combinative of various script types. His horizontal strokes were attenuated like Huang Tingjian's, while his corner strokes were sharp like Ouyang Xun's.<ref name=":10" /> Through the 1680s, Bada wrote in a style reflective of a balance between controlled and exaggerated forms.<ref name=":11">Wang and Barnhart, 65.</ref> By 1689, he had developed his own style.<ref name=":11" /> Starting in 1690, Bada began to study the styles of Wei and Jin calligraphers like Wang Xizhi and incorporated them in his writing.<ref name=":11" /> His brushstrokes became rounded and centered, deviating from his earlier characteristic sharp strokes.<ref name="Wang and Barnhart, 67">Wang and Barnhart, 67.</ref> Despite having established his own style, Bada remained devoted to the study of past calligraphic masters, including Wang Xizhi and the monk Huaisu, in the final years of his life.<ref>Wang and Barnhart, 70, 74.</ref>

Painting

Bada Shanren's earliest extant paintings were produced during his years in the Buddhist monastery where he practiced painting as a hobby.<ref name=":9" /> He painted according to the literati tradition, studying the styles of past painters like Shen Zhou and Xu Wei.<ref name=":12">Kim, “Lotus and Birds,” 8–9.</ref> The subject of his paintings were simple objects like flowers, fruits, and vegetables.<ref name=":12" /> From 1681 to 1684, Bada treated painting as an outlet for his emotions, particularly his dissatisfaction with his second marriage.<ref name=":10" /> He expanded his repertoire of subjects to include animals like birds and fish in addition to flowers and vegetables.<ref name=":10" /> His earliest surviving landscape paintings are dated to this period.<ref name=":10" /> From 1684 to 1690, Bada most frequently painted myna birds, lotuses, and rocks.<ref name=":13">Wang and Barnhart, 66.</ref> From 1690 to 1694, he shifted his attention to fish, which he often depicted alone at the center of an empty composition.<ref name="Wang and Barnhart, 67"/> Starting in 1693, landscapes became a major subject of his work.<ref name=":2" />

The brushwork in Bada's paintings closely mirrored his calligraphy. The paintings from his Buddhist years featured strokes consisting of thin and strong lines – reflective of a calligraphic style modeled on Ouyang Xun's writing.<ref name=":9" /> His brushstrokes in the Ink Flowers handscroll, dated 1666, were rendered like the diagonal strokes of the kaishu script.<ref name=":1" /> He moved the brush as he did in his calligraphy: by first straightening the tip of the brush and moving slowly and then by lifting the brush and moving more rapidly in the flying white manner.<ref name=":9" /> Bada's paintings from 1689 and 1690 mirrored his newly established style of calligraphy, featuring vigorous brushstrokes.<ref name=":13" />

Poetry

Bada started to study poetry when he was seven.<ref name=":5" /> The classical education that he received in his youth paved way for his own poetic endeavors, helping him amass knowledge of a wide repertoire of Chinese literature and ancient characters.<ref name=":14">Wang and Barnhart, Master of the Lotus Garden, 35.</ref> The poems that he wrote often included references to classical texts and obscure variants of characters, granting only those with the same background knowledge to decipher their meaning.<ref name=":14" /> Most of his poems were layered with metaphors and allusions. The obscurity of his language served reflected his familiarity with the Caodong sect of Buddhism.<ref name=":14" /> Bada's poems often ended with imagery.<ref>Hui-Shu Lee, “The Fish Leaves of the Anwan Album: Bada Shanren’s Journeys to a Landscape of the Past,” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 76, no. 4 (April 1989): 72.</ref>

Works

Overview

The vast majority of Bada Shanren's works – 167 out of 179 – were produced between 1684 and 1705 during Bada's sixties and seventies.<ref name=":7" /> His paintings were often accompanied by his poems featuring his calligraphy. Most of his works were uncolored; the few that were colored were mostly landscape paintings.<ref name=":13" /> While his works changed in subject matter and brushwork over time, they all bore a composition that showcased his experimental approach to pictorial space.<ref name=":1" />

Media

Bada used ink and brush on paper to render his paintings, poetry, and calligraphy. He mostly painted on small album leaves in his early years and later preferred large hanging scrolls.<ref name=":15">Yvonne Tan, “Bada Shanren (1626-1705): Art and Life,” Asian Art Newspaper, June 6, 2016.</ref>

Early works (1659–1678)

Only eleven of Bada's surviving works were produced during his years in the Buddhist temple.<ref name=":9" /> These include the Flower Studies album, the Vegetable and Fruits handscroll, the Lotus album, and the Ink Flowers handscroll.<ref name=":9" /> In most of his early works, his subjects were only partially represented at opposite corners of the canvas, the majority of which he left empty.<ref name=":1" />

Works from 1680 to 1689

Bada's work during the 1680s were imbued with personal emotions and political sentiments. His animal subjects often wore human-like expressions.<ref>Kim, “Lotus and Birds,” 21.</ref> The angular brushstrokes in his works were achieved using the side hairs of the brush.<ref name=":15" /> Two of Bada's rare colored works come from this period: the Lotus and Rock hanging scroll from 1686 and the Bamboo album leaf from 1689.<ref name=":13" />  

Works from 1690 to 1705

During this period, Bada painted subjects ranging from flowers, animals, to landscapes. His 1694 album titled Birds, Flowers, and Landscapes featured all three kinds of subjects.<ref name=":2" /> His works displayed a wide tonal range, and his brushwork was brought to the fore due to the large scale of the hanging scrolls on which he often painted.<ref name=":15" /> Many of his works from this period were dedicated to his monk friends.<ref name=":7" />

Anwan Album (1694)

The Anwan Album of 1694 was produced when the artist was nearly seventy years old.<ref>Lee, “The Fish Leaves,” 75.</ref> The sixth leaf of the album is a painting of a mandarin fish.<ref name=":16">Lee, 76.</ref> The fish stares up at Bada's poem on the upper left-hand corner.<ref name=":16" /> The first two lines of the poem allude to a story written in the Shishuo xinyu, a book referenced by many of Bada's later works.<ref name=":16" /> In the story, Xie Wan elaborates on the meaning of the name Qu’e, referring to the Daoist concept of “qu ze quan,” which means “to bend is to be preserved whole.”<ref name=":16" />

Bada's contemporaries would have been familiar with the mythical story behind the name of Lake Qu’e, centered around the unrightful dethronement of an emperor.<ref name=":16" /> They would have thus seen the Qu’e in Bada's poem as a metaphor for the fall of the weak Ming dynasty.<ref name=":16" />

Translation of the poem on the upper left:

“Left and right, what is this water?

It is named Qu’e.

I go on seeking the place where the source enters,

Perhaps there will be many beautiful clouds at sunset”<ref>Lee, 70.</ref>

Names, seals, and signatures

The names which Bada used in his seals and signatures have been referenced to determine the chronology of his oeuvre.<ref>Tynon, “Painting and Politics,” 108.</ref> Like most literati painters, Bada had multiple style and poetic names that each symbolized a virtue, ability, desire, or event.<ref name=":17">Wang and Barnhart, Master of the Lotus Garden, 30.</ref> In his artwork, he used these names in lieu of his formal, or assigned, names.<ref name=":17" />

The twenty different style and poetic names which Bada used at distinct stages of his life reflect his changing self-image.<ref name=":17" /> From 1653 to 1680, during his time as a Buddhist monk, he most often used his Buddhist name Chuanqi and style name Geshan and was addressed as Xuege, or Abbot Xuege, by his friends.<ref>Wang and Barnhart, 30–31.</ref> After leaving the priesthood, from 1680 to 1684, he invented new names while keeping the name Geshan.<ref name=":18">Wang and Barnhart, 31.</ref> Most of his new names contained the word lu, meaning donkey, a condescending descriptor for a Buddhist monk.<ref name=":18" /> From 1684 onward, Bada settled on the name Bada Shanren.<ref name=":18" /> A colophon to the Nanchang xianzhi (Annals of Nanchang) explains the story behind Bada's adoption of this name. According to the colophon, Bada took this name from Ba da renjuejing (Sutra of the Eight Great Human Realizations), made by Yuan painter Zhao Mengfu.<ref>Wang and Barnhart, 32.</ref>

Like other late Ming painters of his time, Bada carved seals and incorporated them in his art.<ref name=":19">Wang and Barnhart, 33.</ref> He came up with multiple seal designs for some of his names. For instance, eleven different seals were found for the name Bada Shanren.<ref name=":19" /> As in his paintings, Bada experimented with space by leaving certain parts of the seal empty.<ref name=":19" /> The parts void of text were often two opposite corners of the seal.<ref name=":19" /> Bada further experimented with the composition by toying with the characters, splitting a character into two or combining two into one.<ref name=":19" />

In addition to carving seals, Bada often signed his work in a wide range of styles ranging from standard cursive, expressive cursive, to seal script. The names he used in his signatures roughly matched the names he used on his seals, while some names occurred only in his signatures.<ref name=":20">Wang and Barnhart, 34.</ref> He sometimes changed the form of his signature for the same name. For his signature Chuanqi, which he used from 1659 to 1676, he changed the character for qi in 1665.<ref name=":20" /> Most of Bada's work from the last twenty years of his life bore the signature Bada Shanren, written either in seal script or cursive script.<ref name=":20" /> The album Huangting neijing jing (Scripture of the Inner Radiances of the Yellow Court) featured the earliest known instance of the Bada Shanren signature.<ref name=":15" />  

Modern copies

In the 20th century, copies of Bada Shanren's art were made and studied by Chinese artists such as Qi Baishi, Wu Changshi, and Zhang Daqian.<ref name=":21">Wang and Barnhart, Master of the Lotus Garden, 19.</ref>

Zhang Daqian was a twentieth-century Chinese painter who made copies of Bada's work. Zhang's copies can be distinguished from Bada's real works through an examination of brushstrokes. Zhang's 1930s reproductions of Bada's midlife work featured softer and more rounded brushstrokes compared to the sharp, sideways brushstrokes characteristic of Bada's work.<ref>Lorraine Adams, “Netting Bada Shanren’s Forgers,” Smithsonian Magazine, June 2003, 37.</ref>

Exhibitions

In 1986, an exhibition and symposium were held in Nanchang, Bada's childhood home, in honor of his 360th birthday.<ref name=":22">Munson, “On Discovering Bada Shanren,” 61.</ref> In 1991, the Yale University Art Gallery held a major exhibition of the artist's work.<ref name=":22" />

Owning the largest collection of Bada Shanren's work outside of China, the Freer Gallery of Art in Washington D.C. held multiple exhibitions on Bada Shanren in the 2000s. In 2003, it held an exhibition titled In Pursuit of Heavenly Harmony: Painting and Calligraphy by Bada Shanren along with the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery which mounted an exhibition titled After the Madness: The Secular Life, Art, and Imitation of Bada Shanren.<ref>Munson, 61–62.</ref> From 2015 to 2016, the Freer Gallery displayed fifty-one of Bada's works in an exhibition titled Enigmas: The Art of Bada Shanren (1626-1705).<ref name=":15" /> In 2023 several of Bada Shanren's works, including his handscroll masterpiece "Flowers on a River," were featured in an exhibition titled, Flowers on a River: The Art of Chinese Flower-and-Bird Painting, 1368-1911 at the China Institute in New York City.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> A reduced version of this exhibition later went on to show at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art. <ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Gallery

• Chu Ta 003.jpg

  Two Birds, Sen-oku Hakuko Kan, Kyoto, Japan

• Fish and Rocks. Zhu Da. MET DP123757.jpg

  Metropolitan Museum, New York

• White Plum Blossoms.jpg

  National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan

• Bada Shanren NelsonAtkins.jpg

  Nelson Atkins Museum, Kansas city, USA

References

<references />