BTW, he was not from Ming dynasty.

I think it is more appropriate to describe Gao Xingjian as an expatriate (as Hemingway was for a time).

Before the Nobel Prize announcement, Taiwan has invited him to spend 3 months there and he had agreed to do so. I don't know if this will be changed or not.

As to whether he is the "best" or "one of the best," I think it is too early to know for sure. There is a Chinese saying - gai guan lun ding or »\ ´Ã ½× ©w . Let's wait at least 50 years to begin the debate.

The title 'dissident' is not invented by me. It was used in almost all papers I read about him. If you have problem with the ultramodern, surrealistic literature, Gao would not be your choice. I agree with you on this. I think I have watched his drama "the other shore" in Hong Kong. They might have translated the name slight different. May be I am not that literarily sophisticated. I was totally lost in what he was trying to present. I can appreciate Picasso, but much less Matisse and those 14-foot by 14-foot painting with one solid black color.

I have not read a complete piece work by him, but excerpts are available on the net. From what I read, and if they quoted the best of him, his best is not much compared to many other writers of his time or earlier. That is why I raised the question. Similar comments were made by many people in the literature circle in HK.

Gao Xingjian didn't get the prize (or much earlier, in 1992, the membership as a "Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et de Lettre") only for giving back his membership of the communist party of China in 1989 - after the 4th of July - and leaving his mothercountry! But for sure is it also to acknowledge his efforts in bringing modern western literature to China - and to honour his status as a patriot-emigrant forced to live abroad - and having a special reason for this. Still living in a pretty shabby-looking immigrants quartier in Paris, up to now Gao didn't seem to care much for worldly materialistic "values", so hoping the prize at least partly also can be some financial relief.

Alfred

www.fa-kuan.muc.de/SPUREN.RXML Traces of Butterflies' Dreams- ½º¹Ú²ª
www.fa-kuan.muc.de/MYPOEMS.RXML

I do not know if AOL users have trouble or not.

The "Slide Show" has been around for some time. Will you take a look, and let me know if you can view them?

I have added a warning statement in slide.html, but do not plan to write a new version for Netscape browsers.

Dear Kathy

We must have missed your query of October 5th. Have you gone to the "Search" red box at the China the Beutiful (CTB) Homepage? If you click at this box and type in Zodiac Animals, you will have a number of links to webpages.

I find the following books helpful and hope you can find them in your nearest library:

1. The Asian Animal Zodiac by Ruth Sun pub. Charles Tuttle ISBN
0-8048-2082-1
2. Animal Symbolism of the Chinese Zodiac by ZHANG Fang pub.
Foreign Language Press, Beijing ISBN 7-119-02064-1
3. Chinese Animal Symbolisms by ONG Hean-Fatt pub. Pelanduk
Publications ISBN 967-978-435-5
4. Dictionary of Chinese Symbols by Wolfram Eberhard pub.Federal
Publications ISBN 981-01-3718-4
5. Chinese Symbolism and Art Motifs by C.A.S, Williams pub.
Charles Tuttle ISBN 0-8048-1586-0

Happy reading.

Congratulations to Gao Xingjian °ª¦æ°· (?), the Chinese writer, playwriter and painter (...) who's got the Nobel prize of literature these days. Gao had been working in Berlin/Germany ¼w°ê¬fªL and is now living in France. (From a Hungarian website I learned he's been working in Avignon/France - my own more "and" less pleasant memories Avignon/¥_¨Ê.)

Alfred

www.fa-kuan.muc.de
Traces of Butterflies' Dreams- ½º¹Ú²ª
¼}¥§¶Â ¼w°ê

I have updated the Picture of the Month by adding a second picture acceptable by Netscape. The full painting of the City of Cathay remains (but can only be viewed using Internet Explorer).

If you have Netscape browser on your computer, may I urge you to borrow another computer for a few moments and take a look of the full painting. I assure you that it will be worth your while.

I am studying the problem, but it appears that a solution may not be possible.

I shall keep you posted. If you are not able to view the picture, please send me email, describing your machine, OS system, browser type, and nature of the error. In return, I will try to send you the file individually.

Dear Ming, Siu-Leung, Julian and Friends

This afternoon after a badminton game, I was going through some memorabilia collected during my travels when I found a scroll of painting that I had bought in Hangzhou. By such a coincidence, it is a replica of Zhang Zeduan's "Going up the River at the Spring Festival", also called "Scenes of Outings at River Bian". I have just photographed it and posted it at Yahoo CTB Photo Section which can be accessed by clicking "Back" to "Comments & Queries/Discussion/Search" then "Discussion Page at Yahoo! Club".

Strangely, Siu-Leung (SL) also found an old book, "Research on Lost Calligraphy and Painting Artworks from the Palace Museum" by Yang Ren Kai, who is the chief curator of Beijing Palace Museum, discussing about Zhang Zeduan's Song Dynasty painting.

Ming has kindly elaborated on the CTB Painting of the Month as an original work by five painters commissioned by the Qing Dynasty Qianlong Emperor. Hence I will refrain from calling this Qing painting as an imitation of Zhang Zeduan's painting, although both bear the same name(s).

There is now no further controversy. I have found the replica Zhang Zeduan's Song Dynasty Cantilever (Rainbow) Bridge Painting, though I would still like to see the original. Ming has shown that his Painting of the Month is an original painting of the same name, but by five painters belonging to the Qing Dynasty. Siu-Leung, the scholar detective, has found his long lost book. We can move to another subject.

I added a photograph of the scroll, with a clearly readable label on it.

The painting shown as Picture of the Month is signed inside the painting at the left end:

"Painted on the 15-th day of the 12-th Month in the Year One of Qianlong by [names of four painters] by order of the Emperor"

Thus the date, the names of the four painters and the name of patron are all there. Forgery? Intent to deceive? No!

As to the color of the photo, it is my fault. Most (if not all) of the pictures you see on the Internet are not color-corrected. My intent is to show that the two paintings are totally different. The difference is not confined just to these two structures. They are different everywhere.

None of us should attempt to play art experts. Leave that to the real experts.

Forgery is not an issue here.

I would like to reach an understanding on the two paintings at Palace Museum Beijing and Palace Museum Taipei first.

Since I posted the Picture of the Month a few days, there has been considerable discussions about the provanance of this painting, which is one of the pride-and- joy of the Palace Museum in Taipei. In particular, there is assertion (by Tin-Kay) that this is an "imitation" of the painting at the Palace Museum in Beijing.

In reply to an inquiry in August, 1998, I mentioned in this space that there are as many as 10 copies of the paintings painted in Qing Dynasty (or earlier), 3 of them are in the Main Library of New York City. I shall confine my remarks to just the two copies: on Beijing Palace Museum and the other in Taipei Palace Museum.

An "imitation" painting must logically have two conditons:
(a) The newer painting copies (imitates) the older painting.
(b) One painting is older than the other painting
My analysis are:

(a) It should be very clear to anyone, who in one minute and without magnifying glasses, that these are two different paintings.
Just look at the two major structrues in the paintings.
First, there is a large City Gate in the two paintings as shown here.

Then there is the Rainbow bridge (hong ) as shown here.

(b) There is no published scholarly articles supporting the relative dates of these two paintings. (Tin-Kay should read S.L.'s comments carefully).

I have read the following 5 references (4 books and 1 website) ; all mentioned the painting and shows 1 to 3 photos giving partial views All photos are of the Baijing copy:

(1)
http://www.cnarts.net/big5Web/KnowArts/paint/history/history4.htm Chinese Arts Net, in China
This is a website mentioned by S.L. It has 3 photos of mediore quality. Rainbow bridge is shown. Photos clearly copied from (2)
(2)
These came from the same painting shown in "Three Thousand Years of Chinese Paintings" by Yang Xin, Richard M. Barnhart, Nie Chongheng, James Cahill, Lan Shaojun and Wu Hung Yale University Press, 1997, ISBN0-300-07013-6
pp.104-106 No bridge.
Painting is titled " Peace Reigns Over the River" Very good scholarly book.
(3) Mao Yi-sheng, "Bridges in China Old and New" Foreign Lanuage Press, 1978,
Fig. 11
Dr. Mao is the foremost Chinese bridge engineer of the 20-th century. He built most of the important bridges in China until 1960's Most, if not all, Chinese bridge engineers are his disciples (including me). The book is comprehensive and gives the technical explanation about "cantilever arch bridge" and uses this bridge as an illustration.
(4) China, A History in Art, by Bradley Smith and Wan-go Weng, Harper and Row, ISBN 06-013932-3 pp.164-169
(5) Dictionary of Chinese Fine Arts. Shanghai Dictionary Press. pp47 and Fig 10

In all of the above references, there was not a single discussion on provenance nor comparative studies of the two paintings we discuss here.

Perhaps some day, some one will study and write a scholarly paper about these two paintings. Until then, my position is:

(a) Every one is entitled to his personal preferences and opinions.
(b) It is wrong to tell the reader of CTB that the Taipei painting is an "imitation."

My view on forgeries is this. If I am copying a masterpiece and sign my own name, it is not forgery. Or if I am not selling it as the "real" thing, then it is not forgery. It is merely a copy of the original.

On the authenticity of the artwork, I think it is like Wang Xizhi's Lanting Xu. What we are seeing now are all copies of the original, yet these copies are all original artworks in a way by famous artists. SO, they should have their own merit. For this picture, it is even more original as the copier was only allow to watch and not copy stroke for stroke. So, you may also say the copies are also originals. The seals of Qianlong and other curators are real, indicating their endorsement for the value of the artwork. So this also increase the "originality" of the artwork. The only difference is the copiers were born a few hundred years later and they perception of the earlier scenes was not totaly accurate.

For the so called forgeries of Zhang DaQian, I would have the same evaluation. If Zhang never became famous, then the artworks are labeled as forgeries. When he became famous, they were valued even known to be copies. Isn't it unfair to all those other nameless artists?

In music and literature there is sometimes a very fine boundary between plagiarism and orginality too. After all we are all using the same words, paints, and notes. If the copy is not an identical one, then credit should be awarded to the copier.

Dear Siu-Leung

Thanks for your quick detective work which has now clarified the actual painting as well as the imitation, which is equally aesthetic.

Thanks also for the reference to the NOVA film documentary which I had mentioned earlier as showing the effort of a team of American bridge specialists trying to construct the Rainbow Bridge (I mistakenly called it the half moon bridge from the porous brain filter that I have) in China. This film was so stimulating that it provoked me to read about Chinese bridges. Hence, I had the unpleasant task of questioning the authenicity of the CTB Painting of the Month on the ground of the bridge construction alone.

I am also a sentimentalist, but I feel that despite seeing a beautiful painting many times or becoming enamoured with it, we must still pursue the authenicity. I must thank Ming for posting such a beautiful painting, which irrespective of being an imitation, is truly a study of Chinese serenity, architecture and sociology.

I have a pretty conclusive answer for the authenticity of the picture now. Indeed, Tin-Kay is right. Here is the analysis. I have a book "Research on Lost Calligraphy and Painting Artworks from the Palance Museum" by Yang Ren Kai, who is the chief curator of Beijing Palace Museum, specialized in calligraphy and painting authentication.

Yang found the original painting by Zhang Zeduan in Northeast Museum warehouse in 1950. This was considered a major finding in art history. The bridge in Zhang's painting is in wood, not stone. The orientation of the boat next to the bridge is also different. Zhang was commissioned by the imperial court to draw this picture. There were quite a few copies by various artists (Wang Zhenzai, Wang Biao, Qiu Ying). Wang Zhenzai has been with the original for several months and he probably had a closer copy than others. Fragments of these copies were made into pipular collections called Suzhou pictures. There were a lot of scandals involving even the prime minister at that time.

I will scan and post the picture from Yang's book in yahoo club.

Dear Siu-Leung

The smaller wooden bridges in the distance are of the beam structure and not the cantilever structure. There is no cantilever bridge in the CTB painting. If you see the well drawn and detailed cantilever bridge in Ronan and Needham's, you have to conclude the two paintings are different. The question is where to see the original painting that Needham had photographed.

Dear Ming

The painting that we are discussing as the original should be the one by Zhang Zeduan. It is because of the possibility of another painter for "Scenes of Outings at River Bian - Picture of the Month" that I wanted to reconfirm with you whether the paintings are actually the "same". Hence, I mentioned at the last sentence that the Ming Dynasty imitations of Zhang Zeduan painted the great Kaifeng Bridge as a stone arch bridge. The original painting by Zhang Zeduan has the bridge of wooden cantilever construction and is shown as Fig. 450 on Page 135 of "The Shorter Science and Civilisation in China, Vol 5, by Ronan & Needham".

I quote the book at Page 134 discussing about the great Kaifeng Bridge:

"The cantilever principle was thus most welcome, since it obviated the necessity for central piers, obstacles particularly liable to flood damage and prone to get in the way of navigation. Forming veritable illustration of the passage is the depiction of a great bridge outside Kaifeng, the capital of the Northern Song by Zhang Zeduan about AD 1125 on the very eve of its capture by the Jin Tartars. With its wonderful detail of everyday life, this "Going Up the River at the Spring Festival" has already helped us (in chapter 3, page 83) and here Fig. 450 shows a many-angled soaring cantilever type bridge. It is borne not only upon about ten great beams arising out of the abutments at some 40 degrees and supporting a series of horizontal members, but also upon another set interspersed within them and rising at some 55 degrees to sustain corresponding pairs of sloping members which meet at the crown of the structure. The whole is trussed together with bars and collars similar to those used with the more ordinary bundles of parallel cantilever beams.

The further historical explanation of these beautiful forms of bridge building is not a very easy matter. A clear des-crip-tion of a timber cantilever bridge with stone abutments is given in the Shazhou Ji (Records of Shazhou) of the fourth or fifth centuries AD; it refers to one then built by the Tuyuhun people (a Xianbi tribe) across the river of the Dunhuang oasis. This seems to be the oldest textual record. Tradition speaks of a cantilever bridge in the Tang (AD 618 to 907), but by the time of the Ming (sixteenth century AD) the technique which produced the Kaifeng bridge seems to have been lost (or was at any rate unknown to non-provincial scholars), for Ming copies of Zhang Zeduan's painting replaced the cantilever structure by a single great arch. "

Having seen the pictures of both bridges, I cannot, but conclude they are different paintings. On the ground of the bridge construction alone, we cannot ignore the difference between the original painting of the bridge by Zhang Zeduan shown as Fig. 450 on Page 135 of "The Shorter Science and Civilisation in China, Vol 5, by Ronan & Needham" and the single arched stone bridge here at Picture of the month. It would have been more diplomatic for me to refrain from any adverse comment, but since this is also an academic site, I took the unpleasant step of questioning this beautiful painting. Unfortunately, and contrary to my more agreeable nature, I must still insist that this painting at CTB should be checked with the wooden beam cantilever bridge painting that is so clearly depicted in the original Zhang Zeduan painting in Ronan and Needham's book.

I apologize for any disappointment that I am causing in questioning this CTB poetic painting, which is so well done that it should be considered an equal of Zhang Zeduan's.

I am not sure how you conclude the picture is a fake. There are several bridges in the picture, most are stone-built, but I think one looks like wood structure. I am aware of the rumor that this picture could be a very ingenious forgery by Zhang Daqian (Chang Dai Chien). He was even capable of faking signatures and seals. But most of his forgeries were done on copies of the real artwork stored in Japan, where he was studying. I have an album of Zhang DQ's work that clearly identifies the forgeries. Last year, there was a major dispute on the contribution of Wang Ji Qian (sorry, I don't know spelling of his own) to the Metropolitan Museum of NYCity. I visited that collection. If they were forgeries, they also deserve the same if not higher appraisal. Authenticity here is only of interest to curators.

Your are wrong about the Scenes of Outings at River Bian posted as Picture of the Month. You have obviously never seen or read about this famous painting before now.

While it is perfectly correct to raise questions and initiate discussions, it is impropriate to make rash assertions and wrong conclusions based on mere speculations.

I shall post more data about this painting - which is not an "imitation"!

Dear Julian

Thanks for your interesting explanation on the Imperial editing of the name of the painting from ÉÏ ºÓ ˆD "Going Upriver" to Çå Ã÷ ÉÏ ºÓ ˆD "Going Upriver during the Qingming Reign" or alternatively "Going up the River at the Spring Festival (Qingming)".

It takes a lot to learn even a small section of the Chinese culture! Alas, I am racing against time.

Dear Ming and Siu-Leung

Since the two paintings are supposed to be the same one painted by Zhang Zeduan, then the "Scenes of Outings at River Bian - Picture of the Month" posted in CTB is an imitation of the original. Zhang Zeduan's painting must show only the wooden cantilever bridge and not the stone arch bridge as depicted in CTB. It is a pity that such a beautiful painting that we see on CTB is actually an imitation. No wonder the right side of the bridge had an angulation defect towards the near bank of the river.

When was this imitation painting done or first discovered?

The painting posted by Ming is indeed the same painting mentioned by you. ²M ©ú ¤W ªe ¹Ï . I remember we had some discussion on this painting in our previous postings. The term ²M ©ú has generally been interpreted as the Spring Festival and yet I have read another version.

Dear Ming

The original great bridge at Kaifeng was a multi-angular soaring cantilever construction of wood said to be common during pre-Ming times, but is now non-existent (ref. The Shorter Science and Civilization of China Vol.5 by Joseph Needham, abridgement by Colin Ronan). The construction of this type of bridge is interesting and was the subject of a team of engineers and architects from American universities (including Harvard). They tried to construct a smaller model in Mainland China with the help of a Chinese professor and Chinese carpenters. If I can recall correctly from the documentary film I saw some months ago, they called it the half moon bridge.

There is a famous scroll painting depicting this great Kaifeng bridge called "Going up the River at the Spring Festival" by Zhang Zeduan (Cheng Chen-To) around AD 1125. The great Kaifeng bridge depicted in the painting by Zhang Zeduan must be at the same location as the big bridge in "Scene of Outing at River Bian" that you feature for the month in CTB. However, the one featured in CTB has stone or granite blocks instead of wood beams in the painting by Zhang Zeduan. Hence the wooden cantilever structures have been replaced by a single jointed stone big arch,

I shall be most grateful if you can elaborate on the painter and the date of "Scenes of Outings at River Bian". Apparently, Ming Dynasty copies of the painting by Zhang Zeduan showed only the stone bridge instead of the original wooden cantilever bridge.

According the the free calendar I got from the local grocery, Oct 2 (when you posted your msg) is a good day for getting married!

If there is a Chinese grocery, or book store near by, check out their calendar. Of course, a copy of Chinese Almanac would be still better.

Thank you for volunteering to do it. I shall e-mail some suggestions and details to you.

Dear Ming

I am honoured to be asked to help out in indexing the topics for the Discussion Page. I accept your offer and hope to start as soon as you set up the annex for the link to the Discussion Page. Do you also want to include a link to topics at the CTB Yahoo Page?

The time is not a major consideration, since I am on occasions compulsively hooked on the Internet for ten or more hours at a stretch. It will be more productive to spend my time at CTB Main Discussion Page, indexing the topics right from the start (15th Feb.1995), and at the end of each month or fortnight. Considering your immense effort in setting up this wonderful website single-handedly, any contribution from me is but a drop in the ocean.

To cite an example, this word appears in the last line of the poem "Begging for Food" by Tao Qian [Tao Yuanming]. I have just put up an English translation of this poem by Mike Farman also.

The statements in your last post of Oct 2 are in agreement with my limited knowledge. Chan (Zen) is the only branch commonly seen (known) in China. There is a page of buddhism where the text of sutra may be found. Authoritative websites exist elsewhere on the Internet.

The painting should be viewed from its beginning end, which is the at the right. I have added a button for you. Click on it, and the painting will be shown starting at its right end.

There are many interesting scenes. There is a train of camels going through the city gates: some inside and some camels outside of the city gates.

There is also a large elevated Stage with a crowd watching some sort of performance.

Barbers giving haircuts. etc.

This is not a painting giving an idealized "glorified" picture. It showed real-life scenes of Kaifeng, the Capitial City, possibly the largest metropolis of its time.

The painting was in the private collection of the Emperor. When put on view at the Palace Museum in Taipei, public get to see it. I am happy to present it on the Internet so you don't even have to travel to Taipei any more. Enjoy.

Buddhism believes paradise is in the West because it is where the Great Buddha lives after death and it is situated West of China. Therefore, as a Chinese, to go to the paradise, we can only go towards West and not to the East ( which is Japan : ) )

I agree that searching will be easier if archived materials are indexed and keywords are added.

Will you undertake the chore of preparing monthly keywords? It takes less than one hour a month to do it, perhaps less after the first month.

Just scan the Month's Discussion, and pick out the words. No need to type, or sort them in any particular order. I can provide you with tips on how to do this easily. Let me know if you are willing to take it up.

BTW, from the Homepage, if you click on the "Search" button, you can perform searches using several search engines in several ways. Have you tried them?

Searching is part of research and is not always easy. Libraians will be needed for a long time to come.

Dear Zhizhong

Chinese characters: please encode by clicking View, Encoding, Chinese Simplified. Thanks

Dear Zhizhong

My elementary understanding is that Buddhism has basically two schools, the Greater Wheel or Vehicle (Mahayana) and the Lesser Wheel or Vehicle (Hinayana). Chinese Buddhists are of the Mahayana school. Please explain the Northern school. As far as I am aware, in regards to Chan Buddhism, the Sixth Patriarch, Hui Neng »ÛÄÜ(AD 638-713), went to Guangzhou in South China when the Fifth Patriarch died, and the supervisor, Shen Xiu ÉñÐã, broke away to found another group in North China. I wonder by using Mahayana Buddhism [ Northern Buddhism ], you mean the Buddhism of Shen Xiu's group.

We also had a discussion on Hui Neng's beautiful stanza which he gave in answer to Shen Xiu's stanza in this Page some time ago.

Dear Siu-Leung

Thanks again. If the sun is setting with impending darkness, why do the Chinese Buddhists call Western Paradise ·¥¼Ö¦è¤Ñ or ·¥¼Ö°ê, in the same direction as Purgatory (yin jian ³±¶¡, ming fu ­ß©²). Wouldn't it be more logical to have Paradise in the East, towards the bright sun-shine? The most holy mountain to Chinese Buddhists is the Mt. Emei, which is in Sichuan, and hence South-west. I think the Chinese Buddhists, with somewhat different customs from the original Buddhist teachings, are in a world of their own.

Dear Zhizhong

I think the correct term to use for funeral notes will be mingqian ­ß¿ú as Ming (Prof. Pei) has written. However, the gold paper ª÷¯È (also called ¶Àªí¯È yellow representative paper) is not for funerals but rather reserved for the deities, who reside in heaven; the paper being more refine and expensive. Whether we can include the gold paper currency ª÷¯È (¶Àªí¯È) as mingqian ­ß¿ú is debatable, so I use the term qianzhi ¿ú¯È, money paper.

IMHO qianzhi ¿ú¯È is more appropriate than zhiqian ¯È¿ú which is the normal paper money. The term qianzhi ¿ú¯È has been used in some books for the imitation paper money and means "money paper" thus implying it is not the normal paper money. I am not an expert in Chinese use of words, so maybe an authority like Ming, Siu-Leung, Alfred, Julian, Rudy, Stephen etc can help out. Thanks for relating that the term dianqian ·µ¯È comes from Ming Wang Dian Zhi Bi (­ß¤ý·µ¯È¹ô). When I am in Chinatown next, I must have a closer look at the words on this inflated currency note.

In regards to yi ding qian ¤@¿õ¿ú, it denotes an ingot-shaped money, whilst yi wen qian ¤@¤å¿ú indicates a (flattened) coin shaped money. (The imitation paper money is folded in the shape of the ingots.) As for the ancient Chinese use of currency, we have discussed it here about a year ago, starting with the use of spade shaped and knife shaped "coins". How time flies!!! If you can try to scroll into the archived pages by using "Control" and "F" keys simultaneously, you may identify the relevent posts. If you find it hard, let me know and I will try to fish it out of my computer where I have tucked it somewhere. Personally, I find it difficult looking for topics by using "Control" and "F". You can let Ming know if you find it easy or difficult.

Chinese calligraphy and horzional painting scrolls all are meant to be viewed from right to left. When one unfolds a scrolls, in unfolds the painting from right to end - always. The titles, if any, are at the left end. The signitures are nea the right end.

Bamboo is a favorite subject and often appears in Chinese paintings.

Since you are serious about the matter, I would recommend that you buy a copy of "the Mustard Seed Garden Manual of Painting", which has been for centuries the 'bible' for student painters. In it, there is a "Book of Bamboo".

From the homepage, click on "Buy Book on line" and scroll down to "the Mustard Seed Garden Manual of Painting". This is a modern English translation and quite inexpensive. Everyone should buy a copy!

As S.L. said, the most well known one is Zheng Banqiao of Qing dynasty. so I put up one of his bamboo paintings for you. From the homepage, click on "Paintings", then go to "paintings home page" and look for Zheng Baiqiao.

While you are on the "paintings home page", you may also look at the "Cock and Bamboo" painting by a famous 20-th century painter Xue Baihong.

Let me how you make out. I hope this Discussion Area is a two-way street, with ideas flows in both directions.

Dear Ming & Siu-Leung

There is an interesting city at the Three Gorges area called Fengdu Â׳£ in Sichuan, specialising in Ghosts and the Underworld. It was a stop-over during my Three Gorges trip four years ago, and the exhibits in the various temples, though gory and depressing, did give an idea of the way the common Chinese view the after-life. I feel safer not believing these Chinese occult pictures of the after-life.

Apparently, during the Han Dynasty Fengdu had two families with the surnames Yan ÀF and Wang ¤ý. So when joined, the surnames became Yan Wang ÀF¤ý (Yan Luo Wang ÀFù¤ý), the King of Hell. During the Tang Dynasty many temples were built there showing the demons and the punishments in Hell, much similar to a part of the Haw Par Villa in Singapore. BTW I understand the Haw Par Villa in Singapore is closing or has closed. Fengdu will also be submerged in water when the dam at the Yangzi downstream is completed to form the Three Gorges Reservoir.

One question, why do the Chinese take a trip to the West ¦è´å when they die?

Dear Ming & Siu-Leung

Fantastic picture, poetical, a study in architecture and sociology. Somehow I feel the painting is more pleasing looking from left to right, i.e. walking downstream. Maybe it is my laevo-rotation and your dextro-rotation because of the conditioning from my driving on the left side in Australia and your right on the left side on the US. I feel the geometrical perspective is correct except for a pavillion (one-sixth distance from the left) which is less minitiarised than its surrounding.

Ming, does the River Bian flow to a lake and not the sea? Is there some flooding within and outside the city gate, because some legs seem immersed and the road surface has some light refection, though some wheels, camel feet and human feet seem complete and not immersed? The only minor defect is that the large bridge has an angulated right side which is made up of jointed shop units. It maybe be an actual architectural or building fault, but a smooth curve would be more asthetic.

Ming, please delete last post, which is an erratic fusion of two posts.

What a research! Just want to add that the underground world in Chinese mythology has nothing to do with hell ¦aº». Yin jian ³±¶¡, ming fu ­ß©² are netural terms for the destination of deceased ones. The better terms for death are ¥P³u¡A ¥P´å¡Aµn¥P¬É¡A¦è´å.

The paper clothes to be burned for the dead is called ­ß ¦ç
The paper money to be burned for the dead is called ­ß ¿ú
The paper household articles to be burned for the dead is called ­ß ¾¹

Dear Zhizhong

You have raised an interesting topic related to Chinese Ancestral Funeral Rites. The paper money and paper imitations of luxury goods are not really Chinese culture nor Confucian rituals of Ancestor Reverence (or Worship), but rather Chinese superstition blended with unorthodox Buddhist and Daoist local beliefs, customs and tradition. Nevertheless, the burning of these paper models and paper money form an important funeral ceremony for many overseas Chinese communities as well as the Southern Chinese in Hongkong and Taiwan, though each has some variation in the timing and the place.

On a personal side, I was unaware of the Chinese funeral rituals until I was recalled to Malaysia seven years ago when my dear father passed away. A large number of local voluntary Chinese well-wishers descended on me as the eldest son, teaching me all sorts of rules, getting various organisations, music bands and schools to help out, enlisting a fengshui expert to determine the time and date of the funeral, and having a scholar to give an eulogy in classical Chinese, which I did not even understand, to my great embarrassment. Looking on a pragmatic side and respectful of tradition, I submitted to all their advice on a subject that I was totally ignorant of, so that my father, our immediate family and the community he had lived with, were all in harmony. This was a start to my learning the Chinese custom and tradition.

The funeral rituals, expensive and time consuming, have been discouraged in Mainland China so much so that only rural communities still practise them. Paradoxically, since the paper money can be used at ceremonies and on days of remembrance, it has now made a come back in Mainland China at the temples, for homage to the gods, and at graveyards, for remembering the dearly departed during Qing Ming (All Souls' Day). As a tourist, one will be amazed at the amount of joss sticks and paper money that is now being burnt in the major temples throughout modern China.

As you have mentioned, bamboo and colourful paper are used to make imitation houses, cars, air-planes, TV sets and even computers. In the past, horses and sedan chairs were more common. The Chinese simply called these paper as multi-coloured paper models ±m¦â¯È«¬. These items were set on fire after some prayers by Buddhist or Daoist monks (or by both groups), so that the luxury of deceased past life will accompany him/her on the journey to the underworld (after-life). There is another form of funeral model paper is the "paper dress for burning" called shao yi zhi ¿N¦ç¯È, a mock textile of multi-colours rolled into cylinders of about 4in by 10in.

The Chinese, under the twin influence of Chinese Buddhist interpretation of re-incarnation and purgatory and the competing Daoist occult views, were made to believe that a dead person had three souls, one in the deceased body, one to the spirit world and one residing in the ancestral tablet. It is the journey of the soul through the spirit world that involved monetary support in the form of paper money to "bribe" his way. Although this spirit world or underworld was called by some as "Hell", it is more appropriately called "Purgatory", since all the souls, irrespective of being good or bad, must make this journey to meet their final judgement, i.e. being sent to heaven, being punished by the King of Hell, Yan Luo Wang ÀFù¤ý (Yama King), or being re-incarnated under Buddhist belief.

The commonly used mock paper money ¿ú¯È are of two types, a) the yuan bao ¤¸Ä_ (precious yuan) also called grass paper ¯ó¯È and b) the so-called Purgatory Bank (or Hell Bank) notes ­ß³q»È¦æ, for circulation in the underworld ¦aº»³q¥Î. The former can be used at the temple, home or graveyard and are of two patterns, the »È¯È silver paper (also called ¿ü¯È tin paper) and the gold paper ¿ú¯È (also called ¶Àªí¯È yellow representative paper). For funerals only the tin paper (silver paper) and the Purgatory Bank (Hell Bank) notes can be used. They are usually burnt at the grave site, though the silver paper can be scattered all the way during the funeral procession. The gold paper is not used for the funeral and is generally used for deities in the temples and in the house. Both the silver and gold paper can be folded individually to form a Chinese ingot, or folded in a sheaf of half rolled leaves. I have seen a Purgatory Bank note of 50 million yuans recently in Sydney, surely making the recipient one of richest inhabitants of the nether world.

In the past the superstitious funeral paper called zhi ma (horse paper) was sold at special shops called zhi ma shops. These papers would have pictures of the various officials of Purgatory; a well known zhi ma paper being dedicated to the Ten Kings of Of Purgatory ­ß©²¤Q¤ý. One would be at a loss trying to remember all the Chinese Buddhist and Daoist dieties and officers of the underworld. One explanation why this superstitious paper is called horse paper, zhi ma ¯È°¨, is that in ancient days the horse was sacrificed, and a model paper horse was substituted, which later was in turn represented by the printed paper without even the horse symbol.

What is the origin of these paper objects and paper money? The Confucian ethical stand that a good son must give his parent a respectable send off certainly played a psychological part in the son's hope that the parent has a good after-life in his/her journey through purgatory. Confucius wrote: serve the dead as if they are alive, consider the dead as if still amongst us, this is the ideal filial piety ¨Æ¦º¦p¨Æ¥Í¡M ¨Æ¤`¦p¨Æ¦s ¡M§µ¤§¦Ü¤]. Confucian rite expected a 3 year mourning period and hence an abandonment of duties to the dependents. Those who could afford but failed to do so were disgraced and even punished by law. Respect for one's parent was held in so high esteem that for a son to strike a father was death by decapitation, whilst the father was usually allowed to inflict injury to the son. However, during Confucius' time, paper was not invented, so this funeral paper imitation was not part of Confucian teaching.

Such imitation of paper objects and money is the more recent follow-up on the sacrifice that were given to the early Shang kings and nobles, whose tombs at Anyang in Henan Province are now found to have animal and human sacrifice, as well as objects of use during their life time. During the following Zhou Dynasty, human sacrifice was banned. From the Zhou Dynasty to the end of the Sui Dynasty, actual objects were given as sacrifice. It was during the Tang Dynasty (AD 618-906) that imitation objects became fashionable.

Two stories exemplified the Tang mock paper funeral objects. The Tang child prodigy, Wang Bo ¤ý«k, was said to owe an old man a tip he received for excelling in a literary contest hosted by Governor Yan Kong ÀF¤½. He was supposed to pay this debt at a temple , but having insufficient funds he used mock paper money to be burnt at the temple. The second story related to a widow, Mrs. Wang Long ¤ý±Á©d, who dreamt that the husband died and wanted to have some money. She then cut out some paper and folded into the shape of money, and burnt them as the offering. During the Tang times, imitation horses were common.

In regards to burning the paper objects and paper money at the grave-side, it must be realised that in ancient days, homage to ancestors was in the show of actual food at the temples and home altars, and not at the grave-side. The first historical mention of the first homage at the grave-side was of the mythological Great Yu ¤j¬ê, controller of floods, who paid homage to his ancestral tombs in Huiji ·|´R at Zhejiang. According to records in Zhou Lidiguan ©P¸Ì¦a©x, a Xiao Songbo ¤p©v§B, had homage paid to his tomb in the Zhou Dynasty.

However, commoners did not have identifiable graves till the Western Han Dynasty at around early first century AD when a Du Zixia §ù¤l®L insisted on his name to be ins-crip-ted at his tomb. Hence, offerings at tombs must be after Western Han, when rich people were said to have pieces of copper placed with the dead. Paper was documented as being invented during the Eastern Han Dynasty by the eunuch Cai Lun in AD 105. This is now contested since paper was believed to have been produced some two hundred years earlier by Chinese tradesmen.

The first to use mock paper money was one called Wang Yu ¤ýðB during the Tang Dynasty, when he used it in the imperial sacrifices in AD 739 against protests by the Confucians. This practice of using imitation money for deceased relatives caught on and became popular. An interesting story of a Song Dynasty magistrate, Wang Sizong ¤ý¶à©v, who destroyed unorthodox temples and banned imitation sacrifices, was that he was disillusioned on his death bed when his own family burnt pieces of silk as offering to the spirits to procure a good after-life. He exclaimed "If the spirits are intelligent, how can they accept bribes?". When the Song Gaozong °ª©v Emperor was buried, many officials burnt mock money, to which his heir, the Xiaozong Emperor, remarked ""Mock money is a Buddhist practice to deliver the soul from Hades, my Holy Sire needs no such thing".

Burning paper objects like houses, horses, furniture, stoves, servants followed the use of funeral mock money in AD 739 when Wang Yu started using mock money. In 1287, during the Yuan Dynasty, Kublai Khan, the Shizu ¥@¯ª Emperor, was informed that the common people were wasting good money on superstitious paper objects and money, and the scholars petitioned for such practices to be banned. Kublai Khan issued an imperial edict banning such mock paper objects, but this practice later came back in vogue as an insurance for their loved ones in the underworld.

I apologise for having exhausted you and other readers with such a long post. There are many more interesting facets that I cannot cover e.g. dressing for deceased (longevity clothes) and mourners, coffin, fengshui for tomb location and taboos like cats and mirrors. BTW I have tried checking the words dian zhi ·µ¯È which you used for funeral joss or mock paper money, but I cannot find it in Cihai Ãã®ü, Ciyuan Ãã·½, or Hanyu Dacidian º~»y¤jµü¨å. Please advise how the words dian zhi ·µ¯È come to be associated with the mock paper money since individually, dian ·µ means palace or temple and zhi ¯È means paper.

Your observation is astute.

This is a large, long painting. It must be mounted on the wall to be viewed. One does not stand back far away in order to view the whole painting. Instead, one should stand perhaps only 5-6 feet (2m) from the painting to view it in detail. The right end is the beginning of the painting. Therefore, one begins at the right end and gradually walk toward the left end of the painting.

In this way, one does not see the whole painting at once, but only a section of it.

Thus, imagine that one is walking upstream along the river bank to observe the scenery on the river.

As one walks, one sees a bit of the river immediately ahead of him. Hence the perspective of the view is from the right to left, as you pointed out.

Most of the time, one is on the river bank, very close to the river. At the beginning (right) end, the river widens into a lake. Here one looks farther out into the distance. Hence the view is more directly in front, rahter than looking to the left.

I think the proper way to view the painting is to start from the right end, and not from the left end. You can acomplish this this way:
When the picture is downloaded, use the "scroll bar" at the bottom of your screen to drag the entire picture to its right end. Only then you can use the "left arrow" icon to move the painting. You will be walking along like in a museum!

If I remember the story correctly, it took the painter several years to complete this painting. Althought he painted indoors, he must have made numerous trips to the river banks.

Thanks for posting the entire picture of Qing Ming Shang He Tu. I notice one thing interesting about the perspective of the picture. Perspective is usually not natural in Chinese painting because usually the picture is drawn from the mind rather than from real scenery. However, in this picture, the artist did try to place himself right where the sailboats are. About 90% of the scenes are viewed from the right hand side. Only a small portion is viewed from the left hand side. The perspective on the left side of the picture is still far from natural in a panoramic view of the whole picture. But if viewed in sections, they are close to natural. This is very interesting indeed. This only obvious to me with your way of presentation.

At the time, I mentioned that some day I may learn how to show the painting in its entirety.

I am pleased that this month, I am able to present the entire painting for your viewing.

You may see the painting scrolling automatically left or right, and to stop it at any moment, then continue to move left or right.

If you are using a slow modem, downloading may be slow. But I assure you it will be worth your while to see this one!

The painting is also known as the "City of Cathay", and reproduction of it is widely available in stores.