Minneapolis Institute of Art

Album leaf

Qian Hui'an

Date

c. 1875

Medium

Ink and color on paper

Department

Asian Art

Institution

Minneapolis Institute of Art

For this leaf, the artist shows a boat just as its oarsman poles it into view. An old gentleman sits in the prow, gazing into the distance. His hat is of a kind associated with Su Shi, a renowned Northern Song poet and statesman and also a popular theme of Chinese painting, but it would probably be a mistake to think that the leaf illustrates any particular poem by the poet. Rather, the Su Shi reference turns the passenger into an emblem of poetic sensibility. It is a painting of so-called yuyin (“reclusion in a fishing boat”), a theme concerning eremitism rather than fishing. Those seen on boats are not fishermen but scholar-recluses who are escaping an official career, fame and other social burdens. China, Asia

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