Thousands of Mountains Invite Hermit Scholars

Zhao Zuo did not realize any great success in his lifetime (he died in poverty), but nonetheless he occupies an important place in the history of seventeenth-century painting. He was one of a small group of painters who helped to shift the center of Chinese painting from the Suzhou region to the neighboring town of Songjiang, where a new way of thinking about landscape painting was evolving. In this long handscroll by Zhao Zuo, we see the essential outlines of the new style: a carefully structured treatment of the landscape, with each element carefully positioned to link closely with what comes before and after. Despite the lofty title given this long handscroll by Zhao Zuo, the tightly organized composition suggests a more intellectual than lyrical approach to describing the physical world, an approach fundamentally different from that used by Zhao’s contemporaries, like Sheng Maoye, who were still painting in Suzhou in a more gentle, poetic style.

(From “A Handbook of the Collection: Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art,” 1998)