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context: painting > Zen painting > Subjects
Landscapes
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Eight Views Of The Xiao and Xiang by Soami, d.1525 |
Landscape painting emerged from depictions of the ideal retreat for scholars, isolated in the mountains, with spectacular scenery. It was never about real places, but ideas of places. Stylistically it borrowed from one strand or another of Chinese Song art, and used many of its conventions: the misty spaces separating distances to create a kind of perspective; certain named types of brushstroke for certain types of rocks and trees. Most (see the Zen Artists section) were influenced by the Northern academics from China, but some, like Soami, went more for the softer, washier Southern style (shown here as this style is not so represented elsewhere on the site).
A strange and interesting offshoot: