Landscapes Clear and Radiant: The Art of Wang Hui (1632-1717)

Wang Hui, the most celebrated painter of late-17th-century China, played a key role both in reinvigorating past traditions of landscape painting and in establishing the stylistic foundations for the imperially sponsored art of the Qing court. An artist of protean talent and immense ambition, Wang developed an all-embracing synthesis of historical landscape styles that constituted one of the greatest artistic innovations of late imperial China. This comprehensive study of the painter’s career—the first published in English—features essays examining his life and achievement as well as his masterwork, the monumental scroll depicting the Kangxi emperor’s Southern Inspection Tour. Twenty-seven of Wang Hui’s paintings, drawn from the Metropolitan Museum and from museums in Beijing, Taipei, Shanghai, and Tokyo, are supplemented by a wealth of images ranging from ancient Chinese paintings to works by Wang’s contemporaries.