Cultivating Longevity in a Mountain Pavilion, 陳少梅 Chen Shaomei

Exhibition Label:
“The Boundaries of Heaven: Chinese Ink Painting in the Republican Period, 1911-1949,” Feb-2009, Kris Ercums
Born into an elite family, Chen showed amazing capacity as a painter from a very early age. He was admitted into the prominent Hushe Painting Society when he was only 16, and spent several industrious years pouring over painting collections in Beijing. Not long after reaching international acclaim with a silver medal awarded at the 1930 Exposition internationale coloniale in Belgium, he moved to Tianjin where he gave private lessons for the remainder of his short life. As part of the lengthy inscription, Chen includes a “ci poem in the tune of Southern Song”:

Cloud and mist benefit longevity
The sun’s rays are splendid at dusk
Flowing water blocks the boats on the river Shan,
Where there is a famous mountain, there is the Peach Blossom Spring.

In the painting, an ocean of spring,
In the mountain, a scene of paradise;
On the peak and in the valley,
Gather together the young and the wise;
All unaware that blossoms and birdsong,
Are prevailing over the Chan Temple on Mimo Cliff.

Exhibition Label:
"Using the Past to Serve the Present in 20th Century Chinese Painting," Oct-2006, Ai-lian Liu, Asian Art Intern
This landscape painting was executed and inscribed by the artist as a 60th-birthday gift for a certain Mr. Dian. Both the painting and the poem contain imagery appropriate for the occasion. It is a personalized message based on traditional literati symbolism. The landscape depicts a mountain village amidst blossoming peach trees, evoking the land of the immortals and thus wishing the recipient long life. A gentleman, dressed in white, strolls along a path that descends from a mountain temple. The inscription indicates that this is Mr. Dian. The figure is not a true likeness, but rather
an evocation of an idealized lifestyle-in the picturesque landscape, the elderly scholar lives in harmony with nature.

Archive Label (date unknown):
Chen Shaomei, a professional painter, was a child prodigy. At the age of 21 he received the silver medal at the Belgium International Exhibition. The inscription on this painting says that Chen Shaomei painted it in 1940 for a certain Mr. Dian's sixtieth birthday. The inscription also includes a poem that reads:

The clouds and mists are good for longevity, The rays of sunlight are splended at twilight; The drifting water blocks the boat on the Shan River,
Where there is a famous mountain, There is a Peach Blossom Spring.

In the painting, an ocean of spring,
In the mountain, a paradisiacal scene;
On the peak and in the valley,
Gather together the young and the wise;
All unaware that blossoms and birdsong,
Are prevailing over the Chan Temple on Mimo Cliff

Both the poem and the painting contain imagery appropriate for a sixtieth birthday present and serve to personalize the gift. The gentleman in the painting is presumably Mr. Dian. He is shwon descending a path that leads from the temple mentioned in the poem. The estate depicted in the painting is referred to in the poem as Peach Blossom Spring, a legendary place of eternal youth. The light colors on the flowers in the painting reflect the rays of the sun at dusk, a traditional symbol for old age.
This painting is part of a group of twentieth century paintings that were purchased in China by Dr. Chu-tsing Li, Emeritus Professor of Chinese Art, for Stan and Patsy Wisdom of Wichita, with the idea that they would eventually be given to the Spencer Museum.