The Chinese paint landscapes for spiritual inspiration

In the tenth century, Chinese artists perfected a new form of landscape, one that transcended a straightforward copy of a scene to emphasize more profound philosophical associations.

The Daoist beliefs that dominated Chinese culture placed great emphasis on harmony with the natural world. The term for landscape was composed of the two characters for mountains and water. These same symbols also represented the male and female—the yang and the yin. Written together, the characters signified a balance in nature. Landscape was considered to be sacred, symbolic, and charged with spiritual meaning. As the painter Guo Xi declared: "The virtuous man above all delights in landscapes."

Chinese landscape art was not intended to record a specific place or depict a pleasant scene. It had a far higher prestige than that of a mere picture. Its purpose was to provide an aid to contemplation and meditation. The paintings were designed to enrich the spirit of the individual who looked at them by revealing the essence of a universal, natural order. For this reason, landscape painters avoided bright colours, which were deemed too sensual and transitory. Instead, their pictures were notable for their muted tones and were sometimes almost monochromatic.

In seeking to probe beneath the surface of things, landscape painters shunned the use of a single, fixed perspective, opting instead to create multiple viewpoints within the picture. This encouraged the eye to move around the composition, exploring individual highlights, similar to a traveller passing through a country scene. The Chinese described this approach to landscape with the term woyou, which means "wandering while lying down."

Chinese landscapes were created to be handled and used in rituals. They were painted on silk and mounted on hand scrolls or hanging scrolls. These could be rolled up and stored away, ready to be brought out during festivals and

10 Autumn Sky about Valleys and Mountains

Kuo His,c.1020-1090