Old Pine Tree
Wen Zhengming (Chinese, 1470–1559)
late 1530s
Medium
handscroll; ink on paper
Dimensions
29.3 × 596.9 cm · painting: 28 × 139.3 cm
Classification
Painting
Department
Chinese Art
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Credit
Andrew R. and Martha Holden Jennings Fund
Accession Number
1964.43
Rights
Public Domain
Tags
male
About this artwork
Here the natural appearance of a gnarled and vine-entangled pine has been transformed into a rhythmic abstraction of brushstrokes and ink tonalities, with unifying opposites—opening and closing, rising and falling—that provide the design across the horizontal scroll. The artist's inscription reads: "The force of change beyond restraint; / The dragon's whiskers are likened to a forest of spears."