Cleveland Museum of Art

River Village: Fisherman's Joy

Date

c. 1302–3

Medium

Fan painting mounted as album leaf; ink and color on silk

Culture

China, Yuan dynasty (1271-1368)

Department

Chinese Art

Institution

Cleveland Museum of Art

The artist of this blue-green–style landscape, Zhao Mengfu, was a southerner, versed in all fields of literati pursuits, such as calligraphy and connoisseurship. A princeling of the defeated Southern Song dynasty, he was nevertheless successfully recruited by Khubilai Khan to the Mongol court in the new capital, Dadu (modern Beijing), in 1286. This painting combines a distinctively southern flat watery landscape combined with features of the northern landscape tradition, notably the spiky trees, branches, and rough-surfaced rocks. Various human elements can be found in the painting: two fishermen, an individual with a donkey, and someone in the house.

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