Yi Yuanji
Encyclopedia
Hunan
' is a province of South-Central China, located to the south of the middle reaches of the Yangtze River and south of Lake Dongting...
- ca. 1064) was a Northern Song Dynasty painter, famous for his realistic paintings of animals. According to Robert van Gulik
Robert van Gulik
Robert Hans van Gulik was a highly educated orientalist, diplomat, musician , and writer, best known for the Judge Dee mysteries, the protagonist of which he borrowed from the 18th-century Chinese detective novel Dee Goong An.-Life:Robert van Gulik was the son of a medical officer in the Dutch...
, Yi Yuanji's paintings of gibbon
Gibbon
Gibbons are apes in the family Hylobatidae . The family is divided into four genera based on their diploid chromosome number: Hylobates , Hoolock , Nomascus , and Symphalangus . The extinct Bunopithecus sericus is a gibbon or gibbon-like ape which, until recently, was thought to be closely related...
s were particularly celebrated.
The 11th-century critic Guo Ruoxu (郭若虚) in his "Overview of Painting" (图画见闻志, Tuhua Jian Wen Zhi) tells this about Yi's career:
He spent months roaming the mountains of southern Hubei
Hubei
' Hupeh) is a province in Central China. The name of the province means "north of the lake", referring to its position north of Lake Dongting...
and northern Hunan
Hunan
' is a province of South-Central China, located to the south of the middle reaches of the Yangtze River and south of Lake Dongting...
, watching roebuck
Roebuck
Roebuck may refer to:* male Roe Deer, a type of deerPeople* Alvah C. Roebuck , American businessman and co-founder of Sears, Roebuck and Company* Henry Disney Roebuck, builder of Midford Castle in 1775...
s (獐鹿) and gibbons (猿狖) in their natural environment.
Emperor Yingzong of Song
Emperor Yingzong was the fifth emperor of the Song Dynasty of China. His personal name was originally Zhao Zongshi but he later changed it to Zhao Shu. He reigned from 1063 to 1067...
, impressed, commissioned him to paint the "Picture of a Hundred Gibbons", but unfortunately the artist died after painting only a few gibbons. A few of his other gibbon paintings have survived, and Robert van Gulik
Robert van Gulik
Robert Hans van Gulik was a highly educated orientalist, diplomat, musician , and writer, best known for the Judge Dee mysteries, the protagonist of which he borrowed from the 18th-century Chinese detective novel Dee Goong An.-Life:Robert van Gulik was the son of a medical officer in the Dutch...
, quite familiar with the behavior of this ape, comments on how naturally they look in the pictures. His other work includes depictions of deer, peacocks, birds-and-flowers and fruits-and-vegetables; many of them are kept in the National Palace Museum
National Palace Museum
The National Palace Museum is an art museum in Taipei. It is the national museum of the Republic of China, and has a permanent collection of over 677,687 pieces of ancient Chinese artifacts and artworks, making it one of the largest in the world. The collection encompasses over 8,000 years of...
in Taipei
Taipei
Taipei City is the capital of the Republic of China and the central city of the largest metropolitan area of Taiwan. Situated at the northern tip of the island, Taipei is located on the Tamsui River, and is about 25 km southwest of Keelung, its port on the Pacific Ocean...
. The "Monkey and Cats" painting is especially charming. Van Gulik identifies the monkey as a macaque
Macaque
The macaques constitute a genus of Old World monkeys of the subfamily Cercopithecinae. - Description :Aside from humans , the macaques are the most widespread primate genus, ranging from Japan to Afghanistan and, in the case of the barbary macaque, to North Africa...
. This painting was featured on a 2004 "Year of the Monkey" stamp from Saint Vincent and the Grenadines
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines is an island country in the Lesser Antilles chain, namely in the southern portion of the Windward Islands, which lie at the southern end of the eastern border of the Caribbean Sea where the latter meets the Atlantic Ocean....
.
The image of Yi Yuanji, with his intimate knowledge of nature, has attracted attention from modern Chinese painters.